I’ve been off line for most of the year while I write my sixth novel called Stanley Place. It will be out later in the year. I’m excited to share more with you coming months.
While I haven’t shared any book reviews for a while, I haven’t stopped reading so the reviews will roll out so watch out for them in the coming weeks.
It may be a long read but it’s a thrilling page turner of historical crime and mystery.
A dual time-line novel, the setting is 1961 and 1973 in Harrowford Hall, a home for unwed young women in country Victoria. A body is discovered there in 1973 as the Home is being prepared for closure and a female detective is reluctantly given the case by her superior.
This is a powerful novel digging up the issues of unwed mothers, their treatment as well as those of their offspring. This is coupled with the sexism within the police force reflecting the disapproval across broader society.
Yeowart does a remarkable job uncovering these themes and at times it gets quite dark with twists I didn’t expect. It’s a well-researched story of the era, completely captivating page after page even if a little confronting.
You won’t put this one down until the last page is turned. Give it a go.
This story takes us to the 1980’s in Melbourne where a young Sri Lankan woman is undertaking a post-doctoral study of Virginia Woolf. She has moved from Sydney leaving behind a broken relationship. She considers herself a feminist but embarks on a relationship with Kit, who is her friend, Olivia’s boyfriend. Despite his insistence that he and Olivia have a deconstructed relationship, the woman is torn with her guilt for Olivia and her own desires.
“Sometimes jealousy was a visitor from an alien galaxy that had nothing to do with me. Sometimes it was a frightening growth in my body for which science hadn’t discovered a cure.”
The woman contrasts Virginia Woolf’s middle-class Englishness with the tea pickers in colonial countries whose work in abysmal conditions enabled Woolf to the lifestyle she had at the time. And I found this to be an intriguing along with the other themes of racism and colonialism.
The characters are never completely likeable and it almost reads like a memoir. I found the story meandered in parts and found it difficult to connect with the narrator.
An okay read but not a memorable one.
What a crazy wild ride this book took me on. It was fantastical as it was imaginative, absurd yet amusing. Ghost Cities also won the 2025 Miles Franklin Literary Award.
This is a dual timeline, dual character novel where one time line is set in ancient Chinese times where a powerful and dictatorial Emperor governs with cruelty. The other timeline is present day centered on Xiang ,a Chinese translator who is fired from his job because he doesn’t speak or read Chinese. He is then known as #BadChinese and becomes an humiliating internet sensation. He attracts the attention of an eccentric film director known as Baby Bao and offered a media role at his giant movie set in a Chinese empty city.
Each timeline parallels the ruthlessness of the emperor/director who without any accountability do whatever they please for their own self-satisfaction.
Ghost Cities reminded me of the Truman show while the ancient times explored the cruelty of dictators. Indeed, the petulance of the emperor reminded me of American politics while other aspects were reminiscent of numerous dictators around the world who have and continue to create havoc for their hapless citizens.
There are stories within stories about master manipulators, chess games, mountains, architectural beauty and decadence along with undercurrents of subversion, both small and large.
It’s a truly interesting book which has multiple levels, and I found myself drawn into the ancient world a little more than the present day. There were times where I devoured sections and some parts which dragged, namely the present day which meandered a little too slowly for my liking.
Overall, however, this one is worth trying if only for the bizarre and bold telling.
As the title suggests, this is the true story of Antonio Iannella’s brush with death when at the young age of thirty-eight, he had a stroke while on a family holiday.
The story of his recovery is detailed and gives the reader a genuine idea of what having a stroke is like but more importantly what happens in the recovery stage.
He details the moments before and after the stroke and the trauma of being in a foreign country dealing with a language barrier as if what happened wasn’t enough to contend with. As you could imagine those obstacles would cause inordinate stress.
Taking us behind the scenes, Iannella shows us in detail the remarkable people who worked on his recovery. He had been unable to walk, could barely talk and effectively paralysed from the neck down. The occupational therapists, physiotherapists, speech pathologists as well as the rest of the medical doctors and nurses were numerous but integral to his recovery. It gave me a thorough appreciation of the amazing people in our medical system.
This is a book of enlightenment which is also filled with useful information and inspiration. Iannella doesn’t take himself too seriously either as there are some quite genuine laugh-out loud bits as he nicknames his helpers, and makes light of some of the more serious issues he faces.
“Wrapped like a burrito, I was suspended above my bed. … hanging mid-air like an Italian salami my dad would tie to the rafters.”
There are metaphors for just about everything and maybe a bit too many but sometimes they’re needed to lighten the darkness of his horrendous experience.
It’s a well written and hopeful story. Give this one a go.
This is a breathtaking and moving novel about a family of four who live on a remote island called Shearwater, which houses the world’s precious seed bank. The island, close to Antarctica is eroding rapidly and climate change is well and truly wreaking havoc. The island was once host to research scientists who have since gone leaving only the caretaker family, a man and his three children. They are to save the seed bank from the rising ocean until a ship comes for them. To complicate matters, the teenage daughter, Fen finds a woman, Rowan washed ashore during a storm and herein lies the mystery of why and how she got there.
Sound intriguing? It is and it’s a page-turner you won’t want to put down. Quite apart from the exquisite writing which is evocative of a harsh landscape, McConaghy provides depth with each character and a tension packed mystery.
The family don’t know why Rowan is there and she equally mistrusts them despite the fact that they nurse her back to health. Dominic, the father has raised his teenagers, Raff and Fen and nine-year-old, Orly for the last eight years. Their mother is there with them in spirit and we learn later what happened to her. Rowan is herself a victim of a devastating bushfire and there are secrets everywhere. However, Rowan provides a connection with compassion and is a conduit to heal not just for her but for each member of the family.
Orly is an unusual child who feels the weight of the job to save the seeds. The idea of how important they are is portrayed from his point of view which at times is a bit of an information dump. Despite his intelligence it takes a leap to see him as a nine-year old voice and this is the only minor downside.
The family live in a lighthouse in a place as inhospitable as it comes. As a reader, I felt the howling wind, the horizontal rain and the bitter cold. I was also moved by the plight of the penguins, seals and whales once brutally hunted but now thriving in the remoteness despite the ticking time-bomb of a rapidly vanishing land.
McConaghy doesn’t allow us to read lightly and we can’t avoid the picture she paints of what could and will be in all of our futures. Mixed with this though, is hope for the family and Rowan as they prepare the move to the mainland leaving behind the ghosts which have haunted them.
This is McConaghy’s third novel and I think her best yet. I loved it.
Check this one out.
This is the fourth book in the series about Detectives Nell Buchanan and Ivan Lucic. Not that I’ve read the entire series but I have read The Tilt so I must catch up on the others. It doesn’t make much difference if you have or haven’t read them.
This one is still a page-turner about the murder of a local entrepreneur in a place called The Valley and so sets the scene for the two detectives’ investigation. However, Nell discovers that the victim is a close relative, that her birth mother had lived there and had known the local policeman. This sets the stage for more intrigue not to mention a bit of conflict of interest which doesn’t seem to matter all that much. You have to take a leap of faith with the connection to make it all believable.
There is graft and corruption as well as greed, of course, theft and robbery all rolled in with twisted family ties.
I enjoyed the writing, the description of the place (the map in the front sort of helped) and the dual narrative. Sometimes the detail around gold-mining lost me.
It all makes for a thrilling and adventurous tale which is difficult to put down. Give up your weekend for this one.
S.C. Karakaltsas 