The Golden Land by Di Morrissey interweaves the beauty and troubled political turmoil of Burma, its culture and people, with the life of Natalie living on the Gold Coast in Queensland. This is a beautiful story of resolution and putting right the past to heal the present, of the role of women in rebuilding a […]

People react in various ways to the diagnosis of a terminal illness. In this novel, Celeste and Nathalie are two very different half-sisters whose mother develops Motor Neurone Disease. Their mother is convinced that a miracle will cure her of this progressively incapacitating illness and plans a pilgrimage in the belief that she will be […]

You Don’t Want To Know by Lisa Jackson is a gripping mystery thriller that holds the reader’s attention from the first page to the very last. The story centres around Ava Garrison, wealthy, supposedly mentally unstable, living on a private island surrounded by family and staff. Two years ago, her baby son disappeared and her […]

Bertie is the “Beloved” of the title. Set in the 1950’s to early sixties, beginning in Melbourne, with interludes in Sydney and then moving on to Port Moresby, the novel follows Bertie’s development from child to teenager. Aged six, she falls victim to polio which changes her future forever, the handicap and disfigurement affecting her […]

Tom Keneally has drawn an epic tribute to the enormous and often less-acknowledged contributions of women during World War I. In this, his latest novel, seen from the point of view of the nurses who coped with the resulting horrors of battle; no graphic detail is spared in the suffering endured, as well as witnessed, […]

Rating: Lush in setting, restrained but ultimately satisfying in emotion, this book takes readers from the hunger and poverty of 1930s Madrid to the whitewashed streets of Morocco, then on to the opulence of fashionable life during World War Two Spain and Portugal. First published in Spain as El Tiempo entre Costuras (The Time Between […]

Rating: Great title. But also a fraught title. Goodness knows, weight loss is one of the hottest and most controversial topics in the Western world and will do doubt remain that way for many generations to come. Alas – it’s often the ‘lose weight quickly’ promises that continue to fail those in search of the […]

This is the follow-up book to “The Art of Happiness”, written by the same author. Meditation is, according to this book, the “inner transformation through training the mind.” It is a challenging and daunting prospect. Meditation is a difficult discipline to master and practise effectively. The structured way in which Matthieu Ricard leads his readers, […]

Most of us might see being happy as a matter of luck, chance, or situation, perhaps something that can be “found”. Happiness is often confused with pleasure, joy or being in love. The English language is so full of subtleties, there is a particular word for every nuance of any emotion. The unusual aspect of […]

Those with a strong arm and capacious handbag capable of carrying this weighty book will reap the rewards of an interesting read about the people who made Australia the wonderful country it is. This work is the follow-up to the first volume of “Australians” and introduces the reader to the faces of colonial society in […]