The Bookshelf
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What are you reading, loving or being challenged by? We review the latest in fiction for dedicated readers and for those who wish they read more.
Episodes
Mentioned books
Apr 30, 2022 • 55min
The Book Club: Jennifer Egan's A Visit from the Goon Squad & The Candy House
Reading Jennifer Egan's 2010 novel A Visit from the Goon Squad and her newly-released The Candy House, with rock'n'roll reader Tim Rogers and novelist Rhett Davis
Apr 23, 2022 • 54min
A moon colony, T S Eliot, Shakespeare and pain: new fiction from Emily St John Mandel, Steven Carroll and Mona Awad
Cassie is away this week, so Kate is joined by the ABC's Tiger Webb: reading Emily St John Mandel's Sea of Tranquility, Steven Carroll's Goodnight, Vivienne, Goodnight, and Mona Awad's All’s Well, with novelist Rhett Davis and critic Nicole Abadee
Apr 16, 2022 • 56min
A Glasgow teenager, a Roman emperor and a sneaky revolutionary: new books by Douglas Stuart, Julian Barnes and Charmian Clift
Reading Douglas Stuart's Young Mungo, Julian Barnes' Elizabeth Finch and Charmian Clift's Sneaky Little Revolutions: Selected Essays with writers Nadia Wheatley and Ruth Wilson (The Jane Austen Remedy)
Apr 9, 2022 • 54min
A snowy Tokyo, a haunted house and a cracked swimming pool: books by Jessica Au, John Darnielle and Julie Otsuka
Reading Jessica Au's Cold Enough for Snow, John Darnielle's Devil House and Julie Otsuka's The Swimmers with novelists Anna Downes and Diana Reid.
Apr 1, 2022 • 57min
The Book Club: reading New Zealand through Keri Hulmes' The Bone People + Lloyd Jones' The Fish
Children, violence, landscape, and powerful and strange writing: we're talking fiction from New Zealand with the director of Wellington's Verb Writers' Festival Claire Mabey and novelist Sam Coley. Rereading Keri Hulmes' The Bone People from 1984 and the newly-released The Fish by Lloyd Jones. Passion, laughter, and even some tears
Mar 25, 2022 • 54min
Mexico, dystopian exile, and Oz suburbia: new fiction from Fernanda Melchor, Toni Jordan and Tom Watson
Reading Mexican writer Fernanda Melchor's Paradais, Australian Toni Jordan's Dinner with the Schnabels and English debut novelist Tom Watson's Metronome
Mar 18, 2022 • 58min
Iceland, Nebraska and the Sunshine Coast: new fiction from Robert Lukins, Kári Gíslason and Harlan Coben
Reading Robert Lukins' Loveland, Kári Gíslason's The Sorrow Stone and Harlan Coben's The Match with crime writer Loraine Peck (The Second Son) and mediaeval Icelandic literature specialist Lisa Bennett
Mar 11, 2022 • 57min
New fiction from Ireland and New Zealand
Reading Irish novel The Colony by Audrey Magee, and two New Zealand novels, Becky Manawatu's Auē and Sue Orr's Loop Tracks, with guests publisher Jemma Birrell and novelist Lyn Yeowart
Mar 4, 2022 • 56min
The Book Club: Monica Ali's Brick Lane and Love Marriage
Reading Monica Ali's 2003 debut novel, Brick Lane and latest release, Love Marriage with guests writer Roanna Gonsalves and RN's Richard Aedy. Love, marriage, migration, displacement, drama, storytelling.
Feb 25, 2022 • 54min
New fiction from Omar Sakr, Karen Joy Fowler and Aoife Clifford
Western Sydney, coastal Victoria and nineteenth-century America: reading Omar Sakr's Son of Sin, Karen Joy Fowler's Booth and Aoife Clifford's When We Fall with guests historian Ethan Blue and crime afficionado Felix Shannon
