But I will squeeze a few more books in by the end of the year. Last book I listed was Pamuk's A Strangeness in My Mind, which was book 44. Then, I went to Ubud. In my suitcase I took one bottle of champagne, and several books, including Lucy Treloar's Salt Creek; Hanya Yanagihara's A [...]
Tag: book reviews
The Fishermen, by Chigozie Obioma
Book 42: I finished this earlier today and did so with tears in my eyes. None rolled, but they were there. I found it moving, at the end, and also found that it seemed perfectly paced, the last quarter of the book. I felt doom, I felt apprehension and I felt admiration. It's a fine [...]
The Secret Son, review in The Australian newspaper
Was very happy to see this review of The Secret Son (alongside Leah Kaminsky's first novel The Waiting Room) in the paper over the weekend. An author dreams of reviews, and they don't always happen, small or big, positive or negative. They don't always happen quickly, and they don't always happen at all. With 400 new [...]
Not a review, on Don DeLillo’s COSMOPOLIS
This is an old not-review that I blogged elsewhere. Apologies if it's sweary, I do get a little more earthy over at the other place. And as for re-cycling it? Yes, I'm being lazy. Yes, I'm busy. Yes, I hated writing that other real review, and yes I'm uneasy about having that other 'real' review [...]
BOOK REVIEW: Questions of Travel by Michelle de Kretser
I was in a pool in Bali earlier this month and had just read the opening pages of Questions of Travel. ‘I knew that in four or five pages that this is a work of genius,’ I said to my daughter, as I floated on some child’s pilfered foam noodle, filled with the expansion and [...]
The Review Page, still in the factory
I'm still trying to work out how to drive this bloody wordpress. I've created a new page at the top for 'Reviews' and I want to have pages linked off that, for each review I write. Not so easy it seems but I shall prevail. Somehow. The last couple of days I've read two blog [...]
So my dear ones
I was going to write my first review on Jill Stark's High Sobriety. No, it's not a novel, yes it's like a memoir of a year without alcohol. But it was so important, I lent it to a friend this morning to read. So, I'm thinking The Great Gatsby will be my first review. Why [...]
Not a Review: Most exciting read for a long time
Currently in the second half of May We Be Forgiven by AM Homes. Have struggled to lose myself in novels lately but this one is good. That is all. PS Here's a link to a recent comment thread at Devoted Eclectic (Elizabeth Lhuede's blog, who is also the founder of the Australian Women Writers Challenge) [...]
American Psycho, almost unreadable
[I have the cover on the left but the one on the right is super creepy and disturbing, don't you think?] I'm almost finished Bret Easton Ellis's American Psycho. It is as bad as they say. At times it is simply unreadable and I have physical reactions - gasping and putting hands over my eyes. [...]
Notes on a Scandal, part 1
Jumping the gun here because I haven't finished reading this yet BUT I just had to mark my enjoyment of this book by a mini-post about the language used in this slender, satisfying novel. Am I the last person on earth to read this book? Published in 2003, the movie (I saw) came out in [...]
House of Sticks by Peggy Frew
I really enjoyed House of Sticks. It's about a mother who has put aside her music career to look after her three children. She has a husband, Pete, who is a fairly equal partner in the domestic running of things, and he is a solid and loving presence. It was refreshing to see a male [...]
Lola Bensky by Lily Brett
I was going to write only a few of paragraphs on this because I want this wordpress space to be pithy but I simply can't harness myself with this one. As Lola Bensky's father Edek would say: Oy, cholera. Lola Bensky is a rock journalist for an Australian publication. No doubt elements of Lola [...]
The Lighthouse by Alison Moore
I read two books last week and this 2012 Man Booker short-listed novel was one of them. The main character, Futh, is a man who is contained and restrained, and Moore's writerly hand was so light it was as if she left him alone to wend his way through the narrative. I am still haunted [...]
JENNY ACKLAND AUTHOR 
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