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243 episodes
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The Bookshelf ABC listen
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- Arts
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4.4 • 264 Ratings
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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.
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Willy Vlautin's The Horse: drenched in twangy music and heartbreak
Award-winning U.S. author Willy Vlautin's The Horse is his poignant new novel about the life of a lonely country musician in Nevada and his chance encounter with a half blind horse. Plus, bookseller David Gaunt reviews Ammar Kalia's A Person Is a Prayer, one family's story of migration from Kenya and India to the UK; and Wellington based critic and curator Claire Mabey looks at Laurence Fearnley's At The Grand Glacier Hotel, which follows a stormy family holiday set on New Zealand's South Island.
BOOKS
Willy Vlautin, The Horse, Faber
Ammar Kalia, A Person is a Prayer, Oldcastle Books
Laurence Fearnley, At the Grand Glacier Hotel, Penguin
GUESTS
David Gaunt, co-owner, Gleebooks, Sydney – independent bookshop [and one of the founding board members of the Indigenous Literacy Foundation]
Claire Mabey, NZ based books editor and critic; founder of Verb Wellington readers and writers festival, co-curator of the writers program at the Aotearoa Festival of the Arts – and she has just written her first novel for children, The Raven’s Eye Runaways
OTHER BOOKS MENTIONED
Patrick O'Brian, Aubrey–Maturin series
Anita Brookner, Hotel du Lac
Evie Wyld, The Echoes
Katherine Rundell, Super-Infinite: The Transformations of John Donne
Sinead Gleeson, Hagstone
CREDITS
Presenter, Kate Evans + Cassie McCullagh
Producer, Kate Evans + Sarah Corbett
Sound engineer, Russell Stapleton
Executive producer, Rhiannon Brown -
Dylin Hardcastle's A Language of Limbs: emotionally true, structurally complex
Kate Evans and Jonathan Green with guests Pip Williams and Sarah Bailey read Dylin Hardcastle's A Language of Limbs, Lev Grossman's The Bright Sword, Valeria Usala's A Woman in Sardinia and Jean-Baptiste del Amo's The Son of Man. Australian fiction, novels in translation, secrets and violence, cities and regions, queer love and emotional truths, and a hint of fantasy.
BOOKS
Dylin Hardcastle, A Language of Limbs, Picador
Lev Grossman, The Bright Sword, Del Ray
Valeria Usala, A Woman in Sardinia (trans from the Italian by Katherine Gregor), Text
Jean-Baptiste del Amo, The Son of Man (trans from the French by Frank Wynne), Text
GUESTS
Pip Williams, writer whose novels include The Dictionary of Lost Words and The Bookbinder of Jericho [Adelaide studios]
Sarah Bailey, crime writer whose books include The Dark Lake, The Housemate and – her latest, released in February this year – Body of Lies [Melb studios]
OTHER BOOKS MENTIONED:
Shubnam Khan, The Djinn Waits 100 Years
Italo Calvino, If On a Winter's Night a Traveller
J P Pomare, Seventeen Years Later
Frederick Backman's Beartown
Arthuriads (an incomplete list)
Thomas Mallory, Le Morte D'Arthur
Mary Stewart's Merlin Trilogy (The Crystal Cave etc)
T H White's Once and Future King + series
Marion Zimmer Bradley's The Mists of Avalon
Mark Twain's A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur's Court
Guy Gavriel Kay, Fionavar Tapestry/ The Darkest Road trilogy
M K Hume's Merlin Emrys trilogy
Victoria Gosling, Bliss and Blunder
Sophie Keetch, Morgan is my Name
CREDITS
• Presenter, Kate Evans + Jonathan Green
• Producer, Kate Evans + James Pattison
• Sound engineer, Roi Huberman + Simon Branthwaite
• Executive producer, Rhiannon Brown
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Awfully Rich: Taffy Brodesser-Akner's Long Island Compromise and more
Money, kidnapping, reality TV, politics, corruption, families, love, and betrayal in all three books on this edition of The Bookshelf. Kate Evans and Jonathan Green, with guests Farz Edraki and Johan Gabrielsson, read Taffy Brodesser-Akner's Long Island Compromise, Porochistaa Khakpour's Tehrangeles and Patrick Holland's Oblivion. Awfully rich, richly awful.
BOOKS
Taffy Brodesser-Akner, Long Island Compromise, Wildfire
Porochistaa Khakpour, Tehrangeles: A Novel, Ultimo Press
Patrick Holland, Oblivion, Transit Lounge
GUESTS
Farz Edraki, Iranian-Australian writer and producer. Presenter of the ABC audio series, 'Days Like These'
Johan Gabrielsson, Swedish-born, Sydney-based filmmaker – and Bookshelf regular
OTHER BOOKS MENTIONED
Jonathan Franzen, The Corrections
Marcel Proust, In Search of Lost Time
Hossein Asgari, Only Sound Remains
Louisa May Alcott, Little Women
Taffy Brodesser-Akner, Fleishman is in Trouble
Kaveh Akbar, Martyr!
James Joyce, Ulysses
Graham Greene, The Quiet American
Graham Greene, A Burnt-Out Case
Claire Keegan, Walk the Blue Fields
Claire Keegan, Antarctica
James Salter, works
Jonathan Franzen, works
Philip Roth, works
Miranda July, All Fours
Clive James, Poetry Notebook
Niklas Turner Olovzon, Iceberg -
Fairytales are at play in Julia Phillips' Bear
The band is back together! Join Cassie and Kate as they head to an island off North America in Julia Phillips’ Bear, plus two Australian novels – Jessie Tu’s The Honeyeater and Finegan Kruckemeyer’s The End and Everything Before It.
BOOKS
Julia Phillips, Bear, Scribe
Jessie Tu, The Honeyeater, Allen & Unwin
Finegan Kruckemeyer, The End and Everything Before It, Text
GUESTS
Tom Wright, theatre writer and literary adaptor; Artistic Associate at Belvoir Theatre
Nicole Abadee, books writer for the Good Weekend, interviewer at festivals, and Board Member, Indigenous Literacy Foundation
OTHER BOOKS MENTIONED
Julia Phillips, Disappearing Earth
Jessie Tu, A Lonely Girl is a Dangerous Thing
Ben Okri, The Freedom Artist
Robbie Arnott, Limberlost; The Rain Heron
Willem Frederik Hermans, Beyond Sleep
Catherine Newman, Sandwich; We All Want Impossible Things
Clare Lombardo, Same as it Ever Was
CREDITS
Presenter, Kate Evans + Cassie McCullagh
Producer, Kate Evans + Sarah Corbett
Sound engineer, Russell Stapleton + Beth Stewart
Executive producer, Rhiannon Brown -
Catherine McKinnon's To Sing of War takes us to PNG during WW ll
Kate Evans is joined by guest host Richard Aedy to discuss Catherine McKinnon's To Sing of War, a novel of love, war and friendship. Plus, two debut novels... Big Time by Jordan Prosser, set in a not-too-distant future Australia where pop music is propaganda, and Evenings and Weekends by Oisin McKenna, set during a heatwave in London as tensions and secrets come to a head over one life-changing weekend.
BOOKS
Catherine McKinnon, To Sing of War, Fourth Estate
Jordan Prosser, Big Time, UQP
Oisín McKenna, Evenings and Weekends, Fourth Estate
GUESTS
Mark Mordue, poet and music writer/ rock journalist. His books include Boy on Fire – the Young Nick Cave, and the poetry collection Darlinghurst Funeral Rites. He’s also co artistic director of the Addison Road Writers Festival in Sydney
Patrick Carey, writer and digital producer; manages content at the Sydney Theatre Company
OTHER BOOKS MENTIONED
Paul Lynch, Prophet Song
Catherine McKinnon, Storyland
Kai Bird and Martin J Sherwin, American Prometheus
George Orwell, 1984
Charles Dickens, Bleak House
Virginia Woolf, Mrs Dalloway
Andrew O'Hagan, Caledonian Road
Jon Fosse, Aliss at the Fire; Septology
Karl Ove Knausgaard, The Wolves of Eternity
J.D. Salinger, The Catcher in the Rye
Mischa Berlinski, Fieldwork
Rachel Kushner, The Flamethrowers; The Mars Room
Eric Newby, A Short Walk in the Hindu Kush
CREDITS
Presenter, Kate Evans + Richard Aedy
Producer, Kate Evans + Sarah Corbett
Sound engineer, Nathan Turnbull + Beth Stewart
Executive producer, Rhiannon Brown -
A new fiction title from bestselling author Bruce Pascoe
Kate Evans returns with guest reviewers to discuss Bruce Pascoe’s Imperial Harvest, an epic of brutality and imperialism; along with Jenny Ackland’s Hurdy Gurdy, a circus saga set in a near-future Australia; and Miranda July’s All Fours, which looks at one woman's quest for a very unique kind of freedom.
BOOKS
Bruce Pascoe, Imperial Harvest, Melbourne Books
Jenny Ackland, Hurdy Gurdy, Allen & Unwin
Miranda July, All Fours, Canongate
GUESTS
Beejay Silcox, writer, critic and literary judge. Artistic Director, Canberra Writers Festival; chair of the Stella Prize 2024
Kate Mildenhall, writer whose latest novel is The Hummingbird Effect
OTHER BOOKS MENTIONED
Margaret Atwood, The Handmaid's Tale; Oryx and Crake
Jane McGonigal, Imaginable: How to See the Future Coming and Feel Ready for Anything
Emily St John Mandel, Station Eleven
Claire G. Coleman, Terra Nullius
Alexis Wright, Praiseworthy
Charlotte Wood, The Natural Way of Things
Naomi Alderman, The Power
Lisa Taddeo, Three Women
David Owen Kelly, Host City
Scott Alexander Howard, The Other Valley
Catherine McKinnon, To Sing of War
Richard Flanagan, The Narrow Road to the Deep North
Sharlene Allsopp, The Great Undoing
CREDITS
Presenter, Kate Evans
Producer, Kate Evans + Sarah Corbett
Sound engineer, Russell Stapleton + Beth Stewart
Executive producer, Rhiannon Brown
Customer Reviews
More recommendations
Love your show. Please consider having more book recommendations for younger readers. It is important to nurture young readers as they become adult readers in the future.
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Fewer crime novels please
Love your discussions and banter!
Awesome wonderful brilliant
Cassie & Kate- perfect balance of your own individual interests and deeply engaging interviews. Your book choices are so varied that I’m awed by your breadth! I also love your great personalities and the laughter and quick witted banter!