What to read this week
An Australian debut, a study of Afghanistan and the mega-selling Rebecca Yarros on our list of books to read this week.
In the follow up to Adrian Hyland’s highly successful Canticle Creek, The Wiregrass delivers an irresistible fusion of an untamed and unforgiving Australian landscape, with a police procedural that will have you galloping through the pages. Nash Rankin is a disgraced cop trying to escape his past. He is now living the quiet life, caring for local wildlife in a small town. Jesse Redpath has moved to town to start a new job as the officer-in-charge. She is greeted by wild weather and a dead body, with evidence pointing to Nash as the culprit. Ned Kelly award-winning author Adrian Hyland has been short-listed for a Prime Minister’s Literary Award. The Wiregrass is the perfect book to read curled up in bed during a cracking summer storm.
Marianne is eight years old when her mother vanishes. Suffering with her mental health, her mother’s final footprints are discovered on a local riverbank. Marianne struggles with her mother’s disappearance and the secrets she is convinced her father is keeping. She comes across a medieval poem called Pearl and begins to create a visual illustration of it. But can the art heal her wounds? In part, a beautiful musing on life and grief, as well as a gripping psychological mystery, Pearl provides piercing glimpse into the delicate nature of our existence. Receiving the call that you have been long-listed for the Booker Prize is the dream for any writer, and Siân Hughes achieved this on her first attempt.
What a year 2023 has been for Rebecca Yarros. Starting with the release of Fourth Wing, which has sold millions of copies across the globe, she has now sold the rights to the series to Amazon MGM Studios. With a unique blend of fantasy, cinematic world building, and romance, the Empyrean series has been likened to the hit franchise, The Hunger Games. Iron Flame is the feverishly-anticipated sequel to Fourth Wing which became a TikTok sensation. No one expected Violet to survive the first year of Basgiath War College, herself included. Now she’s in the second year, the real training has begun. Rebecca Yarros has now written fifteen novels. She’s also a recipient of the Colorado Romance Writer’s Award of Excellence.
The Year of the Locust is Terry Hayes’s long-awaited follow-up novel to the global phenomenon I Am Pilgrim. The badlands where the borders of Iran, Afghanistan, and Pakistan meet is a violent place, but when you’re a Denied Access Area spy for the CIA, you aren’t intimidated by such places. Kane travels to the region to exfiltrate a man with critical information that will keep the West safe. But instead, he meets an adversary who will tilt the world to the edge of extinction. Clocking in at a mammoth 672 pages, The Year of the Locust is a captivating spy novel; Terry Hayes is a former journalist and screenwriter, possibly best known for his work on Dead Calm, From Hell, Payback, and Road Warrior/Mad Max 2. In total, Hayes has won more than 20 film and television awards.
Freelance photojournalist Andrew Quilty has won nine Walkley Awards, including the prestigious Gold Walkley for his work The Man on the Operating Table. Based in Kabul since 2013, Quilty’s images and commentary of life in Afghanistan provide a powerful and intimate insight into the tragedy of war and the human experience that emerged from within. This is Afghanistan: 2014-2021 is a visual record of his years in the war-ravaged country; and of the people he lived alongside, many of whom have died. As one of just a small number of journalists who remained in Kabul to witness the return of the Taliban and the withdrawal of international military forces, Quilty delivers a precious glimpse into this astonishing time and he never forgets the importance of sharing personal stories in a country laid waste by war.
Michelle Upton’s debut novel, Terms of Inheritance, was shortlisted for the 2021 Banjo Prize and became one of the 2022 debuts of the year. Her follow up, Emergency Exit Only, is a beach read that has been timed perfectly, knocking on the door of the Australian summer. Amelia Harris has been working in the same monotonous job for a decade and never takes too many risks. That is until a near-death experience lands her in hospital, and she decides to quit her job for a better life. What ensues is Amelia’s dipping her toes into a medley of the dream jobs she has always fantasised about – a journalist, a wedding planner, and a zookeeper (among others). Her life has suddenly become exciting, especially when she meets the man of her dreams. This fantastic up and coming writer makes you feel like anything is possible in this hilarious tale about second chances.
After such a turbulent few years in global politics, many of us were secretly (and not so secretly) hoping that 2023 would be a little more stable and lacking major news stories, providing us with a little respite. How naïve that was. Satirical political cartoons offer a critical, perceptive, and often explosive, insight into our current affairs, and Best Australian Political Cartoons 2023 delivers an exceptional array of work from the year that was. Featuring work by Dean Alston, Peter Broelman, Andrew Dyson, John Farmer, First Dog on the Moon, Matt Golding, Fiona Katauskas, Mark Knight, Jon Kudelka, Johannes Leak, Sean Leahy, Alan Moir, David Pope, David Rowe, John Spooner, Andrew Weldon, Cathy Wilcox, and more, editor Russ Radcliffe has combined some of the biggest issues, along with the best cartoonists, to deliver the ultimate coffee table book.
Green Dot will leave you in fits of laughter, bawling ugly tears, and deep in profound thought by the time you turn that final page. At age 24, Hera has a new job moderating the comments section of an online news outlet. A job more mind numbing than it sounds. The only excitement is Arthur, an older, married colleague, with who she falls into an all-consuming love affair. Intoxicated by the thought of an ordinary life, she falls headlong for Arthur, a move that everyone, including herself, knows has a deadline. Green Dot is a hilarious study of a twenty-something’s journey into adulthood, draped in 21st century standards and expectations. Madeleine Gray is a writer and critic who has written for Meanjin, Sydney Review of Books, Overland, and in 2021 was a finalist for the Walkley Pascall Prize for Arts Criticism. Green Dot is her first novel.
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