We asked upcoming tutor Martin Langford what he read over the holiday break. As you can see, he got through a staggering amount of titles! Martin will be teaching a poetry masterclass, For the Beauty of the Edge, with us in March and April.   In poetry: John Watson’s “B” (Island Press) which is the […]

“When the enemy bombed the library, everything burned.” From the very first page, it is clear this is no ordinary picture book. This is really no surprise coming from Margaret Wild, whose prolific writing career features a sizable supply of heavy-going topics, ranging from death to ageing to the crushing reality of the existence of […]

“It is empowering to have policy and politics so brashly and personally bandied about. Maiden has these people on first name basis and manages a relocation of political dialogue to the realm of poetry.”

Keen young bookworms from Kinder to Year 4 at Henty Public School tell it like it is in their reviews on these new picture books.     [Kinder and Year 1]  Wombat Went A’ Racing By Lachlan Creagh  Kinder and Year 1 loved reading about all the bush animals at the sports carnival. Popular highlights […]

“When he was gone, I felt like we were set adrift.  The world was so big and scary, and there was no-one there to protect us.” This line from ‘The Cradle Arms of Strangers’, the fifth story in this collection of ten by Western Sydney-based writer Jane Skelton, neatly encapsulates some of the recurring themes […]

Author Barry Oakley’s memoir Mugshots takes the reader on a journey through his life, from his childhood at the Christian Brothers in 1938 to uncertain career paths that aren’t quiet right for him. But among the jobs he lands and doesn’t enjoy or prosper at (although it must be said, the range of job positions […]

Twenty Forty-Eight is marketed as a satire on George Orwell’s novel Nineteen Eighty-Four (although it can be understood even without having read the latter).  It loosely follows Orwell’s plot but in a different setting:  a futuristic world controlled by global corporations where consumerism is the dominant driving force.  The population is heavily subjected to surveillance, […]