This book has grabbed me from the first word, and pulled me into the pages of its world, where New South Wales is no longer a beautiful city, but two worlds separated by a wall. I don’t know about anyone else, but this book made me cringe; a lot. It wasn’t gruesome or bloody, but [...]
I must confess to glancing at the contemporary, stylised ‘movie poster’ cover for Stasia Ward Kehoe’s Audition and dismissing it instantly. (Interestingly, I did the very same thing with Anna And The French Kiss- Stephanie Perkins, which thanks to Persnickety Snark, I later read and adored) Still unsure of what caught my attention and prompted [...]
I have another guest review by the lovely Tegan for you all to enjoy!! I for one, am not much of a space person. By space person, I mean like a Star Wars person, where the whole thing basically revolves around the pew pewpew pew of the ships flying around in space. Although GLOW did [...]
She has to escape. But who else is out there? And can anyone survive days like this? I want to go back to the days when life made sense. The days before our parents became strange; before the warming ate away at all the living things in the world; before The Committee and their Blacktroopers. [...]
I believe we live in possibly the most narcissistic age of human history. No generation has been photographed or filmed more than this one. We have cameras everywhere. On our phones, on our laptops, on our desktop computers and the truth of the matter is, our teens are so used to documenting everything they do on film, [...]
Adrian Stirling’s second novel, The Comet Box, is secretly a time machine. The very act of reading it will transport you instantly back to 1986. The sights, sounds and scents of a typical Australian summer are but a page turn away…except for one thing. Most of us (I hope) did not have the added emotional [...]
There are books imbued with a certain kind of magic. There are books we read and then, then, there are books that invite complete immersion. A gift from an Author to a reader, to give words that have texture and fluidity, richness and depth, a narrative that invites participation and hides the world around us [...]
” ‘When you are a child,’ she says, her expression soft, ‘what you see and what you hear and comprehend can be sorted into little boxes. Then, as you live and learn, all those boxes open up and become rooms. The more you experience, the bigger those rooms get. If you’re lucky enough, there are [...]
Recently I was lucky enough to be a part of the Penguin Secondary Professional Development day, at which Dr Susan LaMarca spoke about units of work for the classroom. One of the novels she mentioned was The Reluctant Fundamentalist- Mohsin Hamid. I had never heard of this particular novel, but listening to Dr LaMarca, I [...]
The latest and greatest of delightful and poignant offerings from legend Morris Gleitzman, does not, disappoint! (As if that is even possible!) I adored Too Small To Fail- Morris Gleitzman. The protagonist of this particular novel, like his predecessors, is endearing, adorable and utterly loveable. My arms still ache with the need to give this [...]
