Gone Guru by Nadine Browne<\/p>\n
Fiction, Fremantle Press, $34.99<\/p>\n
Noni, the narrator of Nadine Browne\u2019s debut novel, has just arrived in New York to complete an MFA program. Things aren\u2019t going well. Her memoir-in-progress has been pilloried by the NYU crowd and her flatmate Vincent has disappeared, along with all her rent. Noni needs to find Vincent and figure out a new writing project.<\/p>\n
Can she pull it off? Can she solve the mystery and stay a few steps ahead of all her readers? This is a funny, smart metafictional caper that revels in the mistakes and misreadings of its narrator (and its readers). \u2013 Catriona Menzies-Pike<\/p>\n
The Second Child by Malcolm Knox<\/p>\n
Fiction, Allen & Unwin, $34.99<\/p>\n
As a journalist Malcolm Knox has covered sports, politics, corporate Australia and the publishing industry \u2013 so it\u2019s little wonder he\u2019s found fertile ground <\/a>tackling the toxic power structures, sycophantic apparatchiks and shared delusions of Stalin\u2019s Soviet Union.<\/p>\n While his 2024 novel The First Friend used historical figures like Stalin and Lavrentiy Beria as playthings for a darkly comic, disarmingly Australian-flavoured parable pitched at the post-Trump reconstruction era, its follow-up, The Second Child, arrives in the midst of the sequel. We\u2019ve all heard the saying that history often rhymes, but in Knox\u2019s telling it feels less like an epic poem \u2013 and more like a dirty limerick. \u2013 Walter Marsh<\/p>\n Osozai by Meg Tanaka<\/p>\n Cookbook, HarperCollins, $39.99<\/p>\n The Japanese wored osozai in translates to something like \u201clittle dishes\u201d, or small, everyday plates to eat with rice and soup. The second cookbook from Meg Tanaka, of the beloved Melbourne cafe Cibi, threads this needle of Japanese home cooking \u2013 perhaps some tonkatsu with green beans goma-ae (marinated in a ground-sesame seed dressing) and a yuzu-bright coleslaw; or a roster of hamburger steak, potato salad and spring greens.<\/p>\n Some of my favourite parts of the book are when Tanaka references her family food memories, including the grandmother who made her own tofu until she was 92. If you\u2019re the type who browses, rather than cooks from, a cookbook, you\u2019ll also enjoy the beautiful food styling with very pretty ceramics. \u2013 Yvonne C Lam<\/p>\n Three Shocks by George Megalogenis<\/p>\n Politics, Penguin, $36.99<\/p>\n No one takes the long view better than George Megalogenis, and his latest weighty offering since Australia\u2019s Second Chance (not counting the Richmond tragic\u2019s The Football Solution) is worth the wait. Megalogenis argues that the last two federal election results were way overdue \u201cwake-up calls\u201d underpinned by three shocks that have \u201creshaped our national identity.\u201d<\/p>\n At the centre of these shocks is a massive and fascinating shift in the makeup of our population \u2013 firstly, migrants and their kids now make up the majority for the first time since federation, and secondly, professional women are now officially the largest segment of the workforce (booting blue-collar men). The third shock takes in the world stage and the fact that Australia\u2019s key allies have become, in somewhat of an understatement, \u201cunreliable\u201d. Megalogenis is the master of making sense of things, so this is essential reading for anyone unmoored by the uncertainty of our current political climate. \u2013 Sophie Black<\/p>\n Big Little Truths by Liane Moriarty<\/p>\n Fiction, Pan Macmillan, $34.99<\/p>\n Madeline, Celeste, Jane, Renata and Bonnie \u2013 the beloved characters at the heart of Liane Moriarty\u2019s runaway success, Big Little Lies \u2013 are back. In her first ever sequel, Moriarty returns to the novel\u2019s original Sydney setting, and once more shatters the idyllic setting immediately, as the principal receives a severed human finger in the mail.<\/p>\n The kids, children in the first book, are in high school now, and much harder to protect. Moriarty raises the stakes in her new novel, where everyone\u2019s secrets are coming back to haunt them. A single-sitting novel to be devoured like (or with) lollies. \u2013 Bec Kavanagh<\/p>\n The Doubles by Jacob K Gallagher<\/p>\n Fantasy, Hachette, $34.99<\/p>\n Jacob K Gallagher has created a wonderfully lively world that reminded me a little of Ben Aaronovitch\u2019s Rivers of London series but in Australia (how many fantasy novels open with a magical battle in Adelaide\u2019s suburbs?) The novel follows Kring, a sort of detective with magical abilities (known as an \u201cEnvoy\u201d), who hunts predatory supernatural entities who travel into our world from an interdimensional void called the Outside.<\/p>\n Kring\u2019s line of work takes her to Tamworth, where she is tasked with solving a mystery: two local Indigenous children have died and replaced by uncanny, perfect physical replicas. It\u2019s hugely entertaining and imaginative; I\u2019d be amazed if it isn\u2019t the start of a series. \u2013 Sian Cain<\/p>\n Cul-de-Sac by Eleanor Limprecht<\/p>\n Fiction, Hardie Grant, $34.99<\/p>\n Given Cul-de-Sac\u2019s bleak subject matter (psychological control and domestic abuse), this new novel by Eleanor Limprecht is surprisingly easy to read. Jacquie, the mother of two at the heart of the novel, is lively and independent, but finds herself trapped in a relationship with an increasingly controlling husband.<\/p>\n Brandon is so subtle in the way he erodes Jacquie\u2019s sense of self that she doesn\u2019t recognise the abuse until it\u2019s too late. Limprecht has written a sensitive, clever and timely novel that challenges victim stereotypes. \u2013 BK<\/p>\n The Brain Cliff by Dr Norman Swan<\/p>\n Health, Hachette, $34.99<\/p>\n Cognitive decline is a phenomena viewed with simultaneous fear and resignation; a sense that it\u2019s just perhaps the worst in a long list of downsides to getting older. In The Brain Cliff, ABC stalwart Dr Norman Swan draws together a growing body of research which suggests there are things individuals can do to keep their brain functioning more effectively for longer.<\/p>\n While the neuroscience is complex, Swan tries to keep the research accessible with snappy chapters (35 of them!) on everything from creatine to retirement, as well short portraits of \u201ccognitive superagers\u201d. Pass me the leafy greens. \u2013 Celina Ribeiro<\/p>\n Trip Reports: Stories from an Australian Psychedelic Renaissance by Rich Haridy<\/p>\n Nonfiction, NewSouth, $34.99<\/p>\n Science journalist Rich Haridy had covered the rise of psychedelic medicine for more than a decade before he had a personal brush with the mental health system, which left him wondering whether the medical establishment is at all equipped to fulfil the much-hyped promises of psychedelic medicine.<\/p>\n Haridy\u2019s debut takes a clear-eyed look at the experimental programs rolling out across the world and laments the missed opportunity for fundamental social connection if pharmaceutical companies succeed in turning the essentially communal act of tripping out into an isolating experience. Featuring the fascinating history of early trials in Melbourne in the 1960s, Haridy punctures the myths around the \u201cpsychedelic renaissance\u201d and asks: surely there\u2019s a better way? \u2013 SB<\/p>\n Grand Ambition by James Curran<\/p>\n Politics, Simon & Schuster, $49.99<\/p>\n