Summer Reading Guide_V08_FA_WEB_Spreads_Antipodes

International FICTION
CRIME & THRILLERS
The Dutch House
Ann Patchett
Bloomsbury
PB $29.99
In 1945, real-estate
developer Cyril Conroy
purchases the Dutch
House in Elkins Park,
outside Philadelphia, and
presents it, complete
with life-size portraits of the original owners
and a servant girl called Fluffy, to his wife. She
is appalled and runs away to serve the poor,
abandoning her 10-year-old daughter, Maeve,
and three-year-old son, Danny. Patchett excels at
portraying the intricacies of family life in this story
spanning three generations.
The Confession
Jessie Burton
Picador
PB $29.99
In 1980, nineteen-yearold
Elise meets and falls
in love with an older
woman Connie during
a chance encounter on
Hampstead Heath. In 2017, thirty something
Rose is searching for her identity and the
mother she has never met. This beautiful
and engrossing read moves backwards and
forwards seamlessly between the 1980s and the
present time telling the stories of these three
women, and exploring themes of motherhood,
loss, creativity and friendship.
Akin
Emma Donoghue
Picador
PB $29.99
A retired Professor’s
life is thrown into chaos
when he is given the
responsibility of caring for
his young grand-nephew,
just before a planned trip
to the French Riviera. He hopes to unravel the
mystery of his mother’s wartime years, armed
only with a handful of puzzling photographs.
Encumbered with his young charge and adrift in
the city of Nice, this heart-warming and touching
tale shows how secrets drive families apart, but
ultimately it’s about the ties that bind us together.
The Night Fire
Michael Connelly
A&U Connelly
PB $32.99
Harry Bosch’s mentor,
John Jack Thompson, is
dead. A murder book he
inherits leads Bosch and
Renée Ballard to take up
the unsolved killing of a
young man in an alley known for drug dealing.
As they dig into the case that preyed on John
Jack’s mind, the question arises: did he take the
book to pursue the case… or bury it? Another
vintage Harry Bosch thriller for all the Michael
Connelly’s fans out there.
In Darkness
Visible
Tony Jones
Allen & Unwin
PB $32.99
In this classy political
thriller, Tony Jones deftly
blurs the line between
fiction and history. Set
between Sydney and the Balkans in 2005, it is the
story of betrayal and revenge, and of the pursuit
of justice in the murky and dangerous worlds
of international secret agencies. It is also an
exploration of the intrigues and intricacies of the
human heart, and the extent in which we strive
for justice and love.
The Siberian
Dilemma
Martin Cruz Smith
Simon & Schuster
UK | PB $32.99
This Arkady Renko novel
follows the Russian
investigator’s search
for his part-time lover,
journalist Tatiana Petrovna, after she fails to
return from an assignment. What follows is a
nosedive into Russia’s corrupt politics, and an icy
land where trouble lurks around every corner, as
Renko scours Siberia for the missing journalist.
The ninth book in the bestselling thriller series
which started with Gorky Park.
Quichotte
Salman Rushdie
Jonathan Cape
PB $32.99
In a modern masterpiece
about the quest for love
and family, Rushdie has
created a dazzling Don
Quixote for the modern
age. Mediocre writer
Sam DuChamp creates Quichotte who falls for
a TV star and sets off on a picaresque quest in a
wickedly entertaining portrait of a time when fact
is so often indiscernible from fiction.
The World That
We Knew
Alice Hoffman
Simon & Schuster
UK | PB $32.99
Berlin 1941, and Hanni
Kohn is desperate to
get her twelve-year-old
daughter Lea out of
Germany even though she must stay with her
elderly mother. Hanni enlists the help of the
rabbi’s daughter, Ettie, who creates a golem to
lead them both to a place of safety. Hoffman
employs her signature use of magic realism to
lead readers through this dark time in history
to explore themes of good and evil and love
and loyalty.
The Starless Sea
Erin Morgenstern
Harvill Secker
PB $32.99
Zachary Rawlins stumbles
across a strange book
hidden in his university
library, which leads him
on a quest unlike any
other. Its pages entrance
him with their tales of lovelorn prisoners, lost cities
and nameless acolytes, combining strangely with
recollections from his own childhood. Determined
to solve the puzzle of the book, Zachary follows
the clues only to uncover a subterranean labyrinth
filled with stories hidden far beneath the surface
of the earth.
Peace
Garry Disher
Text Publishing
PB $29.99
You can feel the heat
radiating off the pages
as the events of this
compelling mystery
unfold. Disher, the
master of ‘rural noir’, has created yet another
memorable character in the form of Constable
Paul Hirschhausen, who runs a one-man police
station in a rural farming community in South
Australia. If you are a fan of Jane Harper, you
definitely need be introduced to the works of
Garry Disher and this is a great place to start.
Agent Running
in the Field
John le Carré
Viking
PB $32.99
Ed is an introverted
and solitary figure
who is angered by the
contemporary politics
of London in 2018. However, in his attempts to
resist the escalating political climate around
him he makes some decisions that prove to be
very dangerous indeed. Fast paced and darkly
humorous, this latest offering by the master of
the espionage thriller is a story for our times.
Darkness for Light
Emma Viskic
Echo
PB $29.99
December release
The third thrilling
instalment in the awardwinning
Caleb Zelic
series. After heartbreak
and trauma, Caleb, profoundly deaf since early
childhood, is beginning to rebuild his life. But
people in power have other ideas. Caleb’s
double-crossing business partner, Frankie, has
something they want, and they are after Caleb to
get it. On the hunt for Frankie and information,
Caleb is drawn into a world of high-level
corruption and dark political deals.
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The Eighth Life
Nino Haratischvili
Scribe | PB $35.00
At the start of the
twentieth century, on
the edge of the Russian
Empire, a family prospers.
It owes its success to
a delicious chocolate
recipe, passed down the generations with
great solemnity and caution. A caution which is
justified – this is a recipe for ecstasy that carries
a very bitter aftertaste. This epic saga takes us
from before the Russian Revolution to after the
fall of the Soviet Union, focusing on several
generations of damaged women.
The Secret Commonwealth
Philip Pullman
David Fickling Books | PB $32.99
This much anticipated second book in The Book
of Dust trilogy is set twenty years after the events
of La Belle Sauvage, and roughly ten years after
the events of the His Dark Materials trilogy. Lyra is
now a twenty-year-old undergraduate travelling to
Central Asia with Malcolm in search of a town said to
be haunted by demons. Another breathtaking read
from a master storyteller.
After the Flood
Kassandra Montag
4th Estate Aus
PB $32.99
The polar caps have
melted, deluging the world
and dislocating billions.
Myra and her daughter
Pearl live aboard their boat
the Bird, fishing and trading with those that
live on the mountain peaks remaining above
water. It is a violent, lawless world plagued with
piracy and deceit. When Myra learns her oldest
daughter, Row, is still alive, a mothers’ fury finds
its focus. A debut novel of epic imagination,
After the Flood signals the arrival of an
extraordinary new talent.
Imaginary Friend
Stephen Chbosky
Orion | PB $32.99
Seven-year-old Christopher
has a learning disability
and one day disappears
into the woods. He
returns six days later with
no memory of what has happened, and his
disability mysteriously gone. Then Christopher
begins to hear a voice and experiences strange
revelations, while the local community is stricken
with a strange sickness. Everyone Christopher
loves is imperilled, and he must face the darkest
of his fears to save them and find redemption.
Grand Union
Zadie Smith
Hamish Hamilton | PB $32.99
In this kaleidoscopic story collection, Zadie Smith
takes on the weirdness of our contemporary world
with infectious lyricism and intensity. There are stories
about drug abuse, race relations, gender identity
and our capacity for a seemingly endless array of
sexual proclivities and encounters. Smith’s writing
alarms, shocks and delights in equal measure.
The Overstory
Richard Powers
Vintage | PB $19.99
Moving through America’s history and its
landscape, this is a wondrous, exhilarating novel
about nine strangers each summoned in different
ways by the natural world and brought together
in a last stand to save it from catastrophe.
Winner of the Pulitzer Prize for Fiction 2019.
The Death of Jesus
J.M. Coetzee
Text Publishing | HB $29.99
The final book in the trilogy sees David as a tall
ten-year-old and a natural at soccer. He still asks
lots of questions, refuses to do sums, and will not
read any books except Don Quixote. Coetzee
continues to explore the meaning of a world empty
of memory but brimming with questions.
Books marked with this symbol are available in Bolinda audio edition.
Olive, Again
Elizabeth Strout
Viking | PB $29.99
From the Pulitzer Prize-winning author of
Olive Kitteridge, Elizabeth Strout, Olive, Again
follows the story of Olive as she grows older,
navigating the second half of her life and coming
to terms with the changes – sometimes welcome,
sometimes not – in her own existence and in
those around her.
Girl
Edna O’Brien
Faber | PB $29.99
In Edna O’Brien’s new book, we are transported
to the life of a young girl who has been
abducted by Boko Haram jihadis. When offered
a means of escape, she grabs it, only to find
herself in a society blinkered by denial. This is
a story of extreme courage, and how to find
meaning in a world consumed by madness.
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