New titles by Gabrielle Carey, Tony Birch and Amanda Lohrey in today’s Notable Books
Business, true crime and a new children’s book in this week’s list of what to read from The Australian.
This book charts the establishment and remarkable growth of Rio Tinto, from exploration in the 1950s, through to the present day. The author stresses that it’s an independent research exercise; he gained access to part of the Rio Tinto business archive at the University of Melbourne, but received no support or assistance from Rio Tinto, “quite the contrary in some respects ie: the Bougainville records”. Australia’s post-war mining history and economic development is one of the most important stories we have, so this is welcome.
Should you ever try to convert a church into a house? That’s the question at the heart of this new novel from the glorious Amanda Lohrey. It’s about a couple who want to convert a deconsecrated church into a home. That is such a good idea for a book. The author says she was inspired by “the selling off of churches, the decline of Christian worship and the use of some cathedrals for secular concerts and cabaret acts … What is at stake when we take a traditionally sacred space like a church and attempt to domesticate it? What do you do with all that vertical space looming above you that is intended to direct your eyes to the heavens?” Buy this one. She’s brilliant.
This is the first in a series of 12 books written and illustrated by Mary Raymond Black. The titles are presented as children’s books but I’m assured they are of interest to “parents and grandparents who read to their children”. They are whimsical, and inventive, and the author has a gift for dialogue, as applied to lop-eared rabbits who decide to venture beyond their burrows.
I’ve been meaning to tell you about this one for ages. It’s such a handsome hardback, and I think it would make a great Christmas present for any history buffs, or boatie-types in your family. It’s about the great merchant ships, which were the original drivers of globalisation, bringing east and west together, “turning (the) world’s oceans into marine highways (carrying) gold, silver, gems, spices coffee, tea and other foodstuffs – as well as ideas, attitudes, religion and disease. The book features the mighty windjammers of the late 19th century, and the author hopes you find it “full of drama, deceit, high-seas adventure and knowledge … this is a book for anyone who’s ever gazed in awe at a mighty tall ship”.
John is the longest serving crime writer in Australia. He’s also the funniest person in the world. I can’t be around him, because I get a stitch from laughing. This book comes with a section called “what the critics say” and here’s a taste: “Dear John, may the Yuletide log fall from your fireplace and burn your house down” (that’s from the late Chopper Read). Tony Mokbel calls him a “bald headed alien”. The book is about crimes he’s covered. He includes a portrait of himself that was entered in the Archibald, with the caption “it didn’t win, proving the judges are idiots”. I like this man, and I like his book.
This new book, Women & Children, is described as “a powerful, personal novel about women, children and justice” from Tony Birch, who has twice been shortlisted for the Miles Franklin. From the blurb: “It is 1965 and Joe Cluny is living in a working class suburb with his mum and sister, trying to avoid trouble with the nuns at the local Catholic primary school. One evening his Aunty Oona appears, distressed and needing somewhere to stay.” It’s a novel in which the bonds between sisters, and the problems endured by working class Catholics in Australia in the 1960s, are bought to life. I adored Birch’s Dark as Last Night, and this book has already made the pile of those I’ll be taking to the seaside after Christmas.
A beautifully presented book by Thea Gardiner, who writes on the place of women in Australian historical memory. This book tells the story of an influential Australian philanthropist, Mabel Louise Kelly (Mab to those who loved her), who was born into a family of pastoralists in colonial Victoria. She married the industrialist and botanist Russell Grimwade, who adored her. Together, they made bequests to ballet, horticulture, free kindergartens and the National Trust. This is number 218 in the second numbered series of the Miegunyah Volumes, named for the home in which she lived.
This is the book Gabrielle Carey was working on when she died earlier this year. She so loved Joyce, celebrating with gusto each and every Bloomsday. Carey was the co-author, with Kathy Lette, of Puberty Blues. Having bounced into the Australian culture with her ciggies-and-surf novel, she veered quickly into more serious works, including Moving Among Strangers, a study of the poet Randolph Stowe. In the Apologia of this work, Carey writes: “I offer this incomplete story of the life of James Joyce as a loving in memoriam … I humbly request that the reader keep in mind Joyce’s forgiving attitude … we are all, as he says, human, erring and condonable.” Vale, Gabrielle.
Pope on faith, hope … and girls
Pope Francis is the first Pope to publish a memoir during his lifetimes, writes former priest, Michael Costigan
Where have all the big books gone?
The demise of reading has gone hand in hand with society’s demand for instant gratification.