From Irish lit to insights on AI, politics and media: some of the best new books around.
FICTION
In Irish writer Colm Tóibin’s Long Island – a sequel to his bestselling Brooklyn – the main character, Irish-born Eilis Lacey, flees her Long Island home upon learning that her American husband has impregnated another woman. Returning after 20 years to her hometown in Ireland with her teenage children, she reconnects with those she left behind. A haunting, beautifully written novel about regret and longing, love and betrayal – and whether it is possible to recapture the past.
The Heart in Winter by Kevin Barry, also Irish, set in a mining town in Montana in 1891, is the story of an ill‑fated love affair between two damaged people – heavy-drinking Irishman Tom, a poet, and Polly, married to the local mine captain. The two take off on horseback and have an idyllic time until Polly’s husband sends bounty hunters to catch them. Barry’s writing is compelling – short, sharp sentences punctuated by poetic descriptions of the landscape, and the dialogue between Tom and Polly is laced with humour and deep feeling. A suspense-filled cross between a western and a love story.
American writer Percival Everett’s James is a subversive rewrite of Mark Twain’s Huckleberry Finn, this time told through the eyes of Jim, the slave, and set in 1861 on the eve of the Civil War. As in the original, Jim and Huck head down the Mississippi River on a raft after Jim has run away to avoid being sold and Huck has faked his own death to escape his brutal father. In this version, Jim is an intelligent, educated man who speaks perfect English other than in the presence of white people, when he puts on the voice of a slave. A searing commentary on the cruelty and absurdity of slavery, told with bitter humour and irony.
Australian crime writer Michael Robotham’s latest thriller, Storm Child, is the fourth in his series on forensic psychologist Cyrus Haven and his friend, former refugee Evie Cormac. In this one, a ship of migrants on their way to England has gone down at sea, leaving a sole survivor, an Albanian teenager. Haven is investigating allegations that the ship was deliberately rammed by another boat. Told from the alternating perspectives of Haven and Cormac, both psychologically complex characters with dark backstories, this is a fast-paced thriller that lifts the lid on the murky world of people-smuggling.
NON-FICTION
In The Forever War, former BBC foreign correspondent (and regular Good Weekend contributor) Nick Bryant explodes the popular myth that Donald Trump is an aberration in US politics. Drawing on his deep knowledge of American history (he has a doctorate in it), Bryant argues persuasively that, on the contrary, the emergence of Trump was “historically inescapable”. Going back to the Declaration of Independence, Bryant illustrates how America is anything but democratic, giving examples of political violence to rival the January 6 attacks on the Capitol and of previous demagogic and authoritarian leaders. Not a comfort read, but an engrossing one that will leave you better informed about America’s political history.
In his memoir Running with Pirates, Icelandic-born Queenslander Kári Gíslason tells the story of how, at age 18, he found himself in a small town in Corfu working for a man called “the Pirate”, who owned the local taverna. In 2022, Gíslason returned with his wife and teenage sons. As they retrace his earlier journey he reflects on fatherhood, including his sense of impending loss as his sons prepare to leave home and his joy at the adventures that lie ahead for them. A powerful meditation on reconnecting with our younger selves and a father’s love for his sons.
AI Needs You, by British AI expert Verity Harding, contends that, far from being something to be feared, AI could be a force for good – as long as humans actively guide its development. Drawing on three historical analogies – the 1960s space race, IVF and the internet – Harding argues that despite the risks, given strong political leadership, global collaboration and a willingness to listen to and address public concerns, AI has many potential benefits, including the capacity to help combat climate change. Fascinating and uplifting.
In The Stalin Affair, British journalist Giles Milton writes of the wartime alliance between the Soviet Union, the United Kingdom and the United States in the wake of Hitler’s 1941 attack on the Soviet Union. Milton focuses on the personal relationships between Stalin, Churchill and Roosevelt, as well as millionaire US businessman Averell Harriman (recruited by Roosevelt to assist) and Archibald Clark Kerr (UK ambassador to the Soviet Union), as he describes the careful diplomacy and political intrigue that culminated in the Allied victory. Enhanced by the recent discovery of contemporaneous correspondence from Kathy Harriman, Averell Harriman’s vivacious daughter, it’s a fascinating insight into an unlikely alliance.
As a former editor of The Sydney Morning Herald, founder of Text Publishing and chair of Private Media, which owns Crikey, Eric Beecher knows the media scene well. He doesn’t hold back in The Men Who Killed the News, a blistering take-down of media moguls from William Hearst to Rupert Murdoch and Elon Musk. Beecher worked for Murdoch as editor of the Melbourne Herald from 1987 to 1989; Private Media was sued for defamation by Lachlan Murdoch, who dropped the case in April 2023 and paid its $1.3 million legal costs. In this book, Beecher explores how abuse of media power works, from issuing instructions to compliant editors to blatant endorsement of political parties to “blackmail by headline” to keep political leaders in line. A great – if frightening – read.
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