New short fiction: ‘Unrestricted Access’ by James Rollins
The first thing I should say is that I am not a big fan of the thriller genre. Crime fiction and true crime? Yes, if it is well written and character driven. But I get bored by fight scenes, car chases and bomb blasts.
I do, however, enjoy short fiction, so I was not altogether the wrong person to review James Rollins’ collection of new and classic short fiction, Unrestricted Access. Rollins is a New York Times best selling author, so there are plenty of thriller loving fans around the globe who will enjoy these stories in his first ever anthology, many of which introduce or give some back story for characters from his novels.
The stories’ setting range from Afghanistan to the jungles of South America, San Francisco in the ‘Summer of Love’ to the Paris Catacombs. And the characters vary from operatives of an elite US Defence unit, Sigma Force, to an ambitious journalist and a military war dog.
The plots are tight, with a fast pace, plenty of action and often a neat twist at the end. Each story has a short introduction by Rollins and readers of his longer works will be interested in the connections with characters or settings from his novels.
If you are a fan of the genre, the twelve stories in Unrestricted Access will have you turning the pages to find out ‘what happens next’.
Unrestricted Access is published by William Morrow, an imprint of HarperCollins Publishers, in October 2020.
My thanks to the publishers for a copy to read and review.
Cute Christmas story for littlies: ‘Rudie Nudie Christmas’ by Emma Quay
A follow up to the original and well-loved picture book Rudie Nudie, this book will delight little ones this Christmas.
Author and illustrator Emma Quay grew up in England but moved to Australia in the early 1990’s and now lives here with her Aussie family. So it’s not a surprise that her delightful crayon illustrations depict Christmas fun without an emphasis on the Northern Hemisphere motifs like snow and holly. Instead, her two little characters run and play, rudie nudie, through bath time, decorating the Christmas tree, wrapping gifts, making gingerbread, and waiting for Santa’s arrival.
The text is simple with repetition that allows children to ‘read along’:
Rudie Nudie gingerbread
Rudie Nudie by Emma Quay
will make it twice as fun,
with two more Rudie Nudies
on a Nudie Rudie run.This is a lovely Christmas offering for kids three years and over who love to snuggle up while mum, grandpa or big brother reads aloud; the simple text also makes it perfect for beginner readers.
Rudie Nudie Christmas is published by HarperCollins Children’s Books in October 2020.
My thanks to the publishers for a review copy.#rudienudiechristmas
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#Aww2020A microcosm of a world in turmoil: ‘The Pull of the Stars’ by Emma Donoghue
What a marvel of a novel this is. Emma Donoghue has written a story that explores profound human issues – hope, survival, struggle – within the minutiae of three days in a tiny hospital ward, allowing glimpses of the social, religious, political and health influences swirling around the small cast of characters. I can absolutely see this story brought to life as a stage play or movie.
The timing of The Pull of the Stars is uncanny. Published in mid 2020 during a world pandemic, it is set during another pandemic, the global influenza outbreak a century ago. Reading it now, as we struggle with Covid-19, I was struck by so many similarities between then and now.
The story takes place over three days, in a short-staffed Dublin hospital. Julia is a nurse, working long days in the maternity/fever ward, where there are three patients about to give birth who are also suffering from influenza.
The author pays tribute to the struggles of people from all levels of Irish society at the time. The poverty, religious conservatism and bigotry of early nineteenth century Ireland imposed added burdens for many, but middle class women were not immune to influenza or its effects on pregnant women, which could have dire consequences for mothers and babies.
If you are squeamish about the icky parts of the body’s functioning during childbirth or illness, you might find some scenes in this book challenging. Personally, I loved the way the author honoured the crucial role of nurses during what are profound and dramatic moments: the work and risk of bringing new life into the world, and the struggle against an illness that could strike from nowhere and kill in a matter of days, even hours. The research that went into the book was evidently deep but sits lightly in the narrative.
The characters – nurse Julia; young, poor Bridie, a volunteer helper in Julia’s ward; and the three sick, labouring women they care for – form the nucleus of the story, though the other characters are well drawn and entirely believable. We meet Dr Kathleen Lynn, rumoured to be a Rebel on the run from police, but whose calm and compassionate approach prompts Julia to question her own assumptions and beliefs. Dr Lynn is based on a real figure, a Sinn Féin rebel who later established a hospital for impoverished mothers and babies.
The intense work of the hospital is set against the background of an Ireland at war: internally in the aftermath of the 1916 Rebellion, and externally as the Great War is still being waged throughout Europe. As Julia realises:
It occurred to me that in the case of this flu, there could be no signing a pact with it. What we waged in hospitals was a war of attrition, a battle over each and every body.
The Pull of the Stars.One aspect of the novel that I particularly enjoyed was that the business of childbirth – those giving birth and those helping labouring women – was front and centre, much as in another book I have reviewed this year, The German Midwife. Perhaps it is no coincidence that both novels juxtapose the battles of women in the process of giving life, against the battles of war, which are all about taking it.
There is so much to love about The Pull of the Stars. I listened to the Audible audiobook version, where the narration by Emma Lowe added another layer of enjoyment. It’s a wonderful book with timeless themes and compelling characters.
The Pull of the Stars was published by Allen & Unwin Australia in July 2020.
Dreams and wishes: ‘What We’ll Build : Plans for our together future’ by Oliver Jeffers
In this new picture book by creator and artist Oliver Jeffers, a man and his little girl dream about projects they can work on together.
The simple text builds its own gentle rhythm while the witty illustrations allow a glimpse into the subtext; sometimes humorous, sometimes wry, and always touching.
We’ll build some love to set aside
What We’ll Build
and build a hole where we can hide.
A fortress to keep our enemies out,
and higher walls for when they shout.
But you don’t always lose and you don’t always win,
so we’ll build a gate to let them in.
We’ll build a table to drink our tea, and say
‘I’m sorry’, ‘Me two’, ‘Me three’.The book’s presentation is beautiful: hard-cover with a colour soaked dust cover, making it perfect for a gift for a special youngster.
What We’ll Build is a love letter to children, to dreams and possibilities and to the special relationship between fathers and their daughters.
What We’ll Build is published by HarperCollins Children’s Books in October 2020.
My thanks to the publishers for a copy to read and review.
A picture book for all of us: ‘The Great Realisation’ by Tomos Roberts
Tomos Roberts (‘Tomfoolery’) wrote the poem The Great Realisation and launched it on his YouTube channel in March 2020. It’s a poem of simple hope, and a plea for all of us to use the lessons and perspective of ‘2020 hindsight’ to create a better, more loving world once the global pandemic has receded.
Here’s Tomos and his brother and sister with the poem on his ‘Tomfoolery’ YouTube channel.
He has now brought his beautiful and encouraging words to book form with the addition of watercolour illustrations by Japanese artist Nomoco.
Roberts wrote The Great Realisation for his young siblings while in Covid19 lockdown. But I think the poem is for all of us. Its simplicity allows us to put aside our doubts, fears and cynicism and, perhaps just for a moment, imagine future possibilities for the whole world.
The book would be a perfect addition to school libraries and classrooms.
Other videos on the Tomfoolery YouTube channelhttps://www.probablytomfoolery.com/ are worth a visit, for a dose of what I think of as ‘sensible optimism’. I highly recommend A Tale of Two Mindsets for a few minutes of poetry that will help to deter the cynicism and doubts!
My thanks to HarperCollins Children’s Books for a copy of this wonderful book to review.
Another gem from Kate Grenville: ‘A Room Made of Leaves’
The title of Kate Grenville’s latest and much anticipated novel put me in mind of the famous work by Virginia Woolfe – A Room of One’s Own. The message in both titles includes, I believe, the necessity for all women to have a space (whether that be an actual room, a favourite place in nature, or a corner of their imagination) where they can dream, write, plan, think, or simply be. In this and in many other ways, while A Room Made of Leaves might be a work of historical fiction, its themes are as relevant to today as to the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries.
Kate Grenville is well known to many Australian readers for her novels of colonial Australia, particularly The Secret River, The Lieutenant, and Sarah Thornton.
Her new work has a most wonderful premise: that she has stumbled upon and transcribed the private writings of Elizabeth MacArthur, the wife of John MacArthur, Captain in the NSW Corps and so-called ‘father of the Australian wool industry.’ These scribblings are a ‘warts and all’ account of Elizabeth’s life, much more honest than the carefully penned letters that she wrote for public consumption.
As always, Ms Grenville captures perfectly the voice of her protagonist, a woman of modest background but reasonable education, and convinces us that we are, in fact, hearing a first-hand account of life in colonial Sydney and Parramatta. Through Elizabeth, we meet some of the well-known figures of that time including John MacArthur himself, and Governor Phillip, Watkin Tench, Lieutenant Dawes; also Pemulwuy and other First Nations people who influenced the development of the faltering settlements.
Of course, her real opinions and feelings about her husband, her life and her new home, as compared to the public ones, form the backbone of the narrative and serve to show Elizabeth MacArthur as a woman of much greater aptitude and empathy than the man she is tied to in marriage.
I absolutely loved the way in which the author has used snippets of the actual letters and other writings of Elizabeth, in a way that brings her to life and also hints that she may well have had quite a different inner life than the serene and uncomplaining face she presented to the world.
Elizabeth MacArthur, 1766-1850, from
oil painting in State Library of NSWWriting about a time when women had little agency, she shows that through carefully chosen words, sly irony, and well-kept secrets, some women could and did manage to execute a certain degree of independence of thought, even if that was not always visible to others.
A Room Made of Leaves joins the list of simply wonderful novels by Kate Grenville about early colonial Australia. If you enjoyed her earlier ones, you will love this book.
A Room Made of Leaves was published by Text Publishing in 2020.
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#AWW2020Gothic blend of crime and small town life: ‘The Mystery Woman’ by Belinda Alexandra
Rebecca moves to Shipwreck Bay to take up the position of postmistress in the small coastal town. She is nursing a secret after the end of her relationship with a well-known politician and she dreads being exposed as his mistress. What she finds is that Shipwreck Bay has several secrets of its own.
Her plan to hide away from the controversy surrounding her former life turns out to be far more difficult than she imagined. To begin with, Rebecca is not the sort of women who blends in easily – her fashionable clothes, striking looks and style stand out against the blandness of the town and its inhabitants.
Rebecca needs to tread carefully, to navigate between her need to keep on the right side of the community and her need to avoid unwanted attention.
Her arrival sets tongues wagging. Women are suspicious of her – she is in her thirties, beautiful and not married (more unusual in 1950’s Australia than now) – and men ogle her shamelessly, including the married ones. The town and its citizens are portrayed in less than complimentary ways, with all the prejudices and small-town attitudes proving stifling to Rebecca’s creative spirit, and the hypocrisy and double standards of that era posing real threats, should her past be discovered:
She was living two parallel lives – one as a postmistress gradually finding her place in the town, and another as a hunted animal that was about to be destroyed by the beast of the press.
‘Unique and different are fine for men!’ she said. ‘When you live your lives how you want to, people applaud you. It’s not like that for women. We are crucified for doing as we please.’
The Mystery Woman p128 & 282The secrets beneath Shipwreck Bay’s placid surface pose other kinds of dangers: here the author touches on issues of domestic violence, sexual harassment and the abuse of vulnerable people. Environmental issues are also woven into the novel, as Shipwreck Bay’s economy is heavily dependent on the brutal whaling industry (which continued in Australia up until the 1970’s, seriously depleting whale numbers on their migratory routes.)
I found Rebecca, and most of the characters of Shipwreck Bay, not very likeable. Having grown up in a very small country village myself, I can recognise the pettiness and love of gossip that often characterise small communities. What I remember most, though, are the many everyday kindnesses and genuine community spirit of the place.
Of course, The Mystery Woman is at heart a crime novel, so the peculiarities of a small town and its people feel malevolent when viewed through this lens. Even the beauty of the seascape is foreboding for Rebecca.
She is a woman who has made poor choices in the past and is left second guessing her every move. Will she make yet another mistake now, when the outcome could be so much more dangerous?
The Mystery Woman is a novel of gothic drama: a passionate heroine, with secrets to protect and a beautiful setting with secrets of its own; danger; and redemption. It explores themes that are no less relevant today than they were in the Australia of the 1950’s.
The Mystery Woman is published by HarperCollins in September 2020.
My thanks to the publishers for a copy to read and review.
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#AWW2020Absurd and whimsical story kids will love: ‘The Tindims of Rubbish Island’ by Sally Gardner & Lydia Corry
I love the fact that the creators of this book series for early readers (5 – 8 years) are a mother and daughter team: Sally Gardner and Lydia Corry. How perfect to have a writer and an illustrator in one family package, ready to delight young readers.
The Tindims are tiny folk who have lived on Rubbish Island for centuries, retrieving items discarded by the ‘Long Legs’ (humans) and making useful, wearable or fun stuff from them. Lately, though, there is far more plastic in the sea than even the Tindims know what to do with.
The main character Skittle and her furry pet Pinch, enjoy life to the full and laugh a lot, just like human children do. In their world, everything they find in the sea is a possible treasure. This first book in the Tindims series introduces readers to the characters and colour of the tiny island on which the Tindims live, and how they use the rubbish they find.
Skittle and her friends and family are looking forward to Brightsea Festival, a yearly event filled with fun, when the progress of their island gets blocked by Bottle Mountain and they can’t see which direction they need to go. Adventures and absurdities follow, until all is well by the end of the book.
Children will have fun with Lydia Correy’s jaunty black and white illustrations, identifying all the items of rubbish which the Tindims use: as hats, a cable car, houses, a fish hospital, furniture, to name just a few.
The narrative has a slightly ‘Winnie-the-Pooh’ feel to it as it explores the simple things in life that can bring us joy.The Tindims of Rubbish Island is a sweet and engaging way to introduce very young readers to the idea of conservation and recycling, while having a lot of fun in the process.
The Tindims of Rubbish Island is published by Head of Zeus, an imprint of HarperCollins Children’s Books, today (2nd September 2020.)
My thanks to the publishers for a copy to read and review.
How the heart survives: ‘The Tolstoy Estate’ by Steven Conte
The Tolstoy Estate is described as ‘a novel for people who still believe in the saving grace of literature in dark times’ and literature – particularly the work of Leo Tolstoy – is at its heart.
During the ill-fated German assault on Russia in the winter of 1941, military doctor Paul Bauer is assigned to a field hospital established at ‘Yasnaya Polyana’, the ancestral home of Russian writer Leo Tolstoy. We quickly realise that Bauer’s heart is not invested in the ideologies of the Nazi Reich, though he does feel loyalty to his comrades and to his mission as a doctor.
On arrival at the estate he meets Katerina, the guardian of the property which has great cultural importance for Russians. In Katerina’s youth, she was a passionate supporter of the Revolution; this conviction has faded over the years, replaced by what could best be described as a critique of its methods and results, mixed with a deep love for her country in the face of the invader’s army. She is – understandably – hostile towards the Germans, but Paul recognises her fierce intelligence and a shared love of literature, and a friendship develops between them, despite the difficult circumstances.
Paul’s job is to treat and repair the damage done to German soldiers on the front. He and his colleagues work under appalling conditions, made particularly hard by the brutal winter cold – with temperatures as low as minus 41 Celsius – inconceivable to someone like me, who lives on one of the warmer continents on Earth.
The author is unflinching in describing the kinds of operations Paul and his colleagues perform, with enough authentic detail to make the scenes in the makeshift surgical theatre feel visceral. The waves of injured, sick and frostbitten soldiers keep on coming throughout the novel; the horror of the conflict always there. Even eyelids could be lost to frostbite, apparently: a prospect too awful to contemplate. The German troops were ill equipped to wage war in a Russian winter, with winter clothes late arriving, so that the soldiers were wearing summer uniforms well after the onset of cold weather.
The theme of literature’s role in society is explored throughout, contrasting with the butchery taking place on the battlefields. Paul’s commanding officer Metz (who is experimenting with new drugs to ‘sharpen his soldierly performance’ – with awful results) boasts to Katerina that:
‘Deeds, not words, gnadige Frau, are the currency of greatness…with his rifle our humblest Landser shapes the world more profoundly than your Tolstoy ever did.
To which Katerina replies:
‘How odd. You sound rather like him in War and Peace -the dull bits: the little man as mover of Great Events. But you’re mistaken. Lev Tolstoy’s books certainly did shape history. He’s still at it, in fact, tipping the war in our favour.’
The Tolstoy Estate p28And of course, the events of War and Peace are foregrounded, as the fate of the German army replicates that of Napoleon’s, on his unsuccessful invasion of Russia a century earlier.
This novel is a celebration of the human heart and the beauty of words and ideas, even when surrounded by the very worst of human behaviour. Paul is certain of this when he says to Katerina:
Yes, what do is important. For the individual it’s vital. But the body is transient, we all know that. It’s stuff. You writers, you forge culture, and culture is eternal. Or as good as…I believe {literature} is beneficial…And enduring. Even the worst of it survives its author, and the best outlives the language it’s composed in. I can’t imagine what it must be like to … know that in fifty, one hundred, two hundred years there will be someone, somewhere reading your books.
The Tolstoy Estate p175The Tolstoy Estate is published by Fourth Estate, an imprint of HarperCollins Publishing, in September 2020.
My thanks to the publisher for a review copy.Sweet and colourful: ‘The Polar Bear in Sydney Harbour’ by Beck & Robin Feiner
Kids (of all ages) enjoy incongruities and humour and this is definitely a feature of the new picture book by Sydney-based husband and wife team Beck and Robin Feiner.
‘When Hannah spots a polar bear in Sydney Harbour, she knows something isn’t right…But even worse, none of the adults seem to notice him at all.
The polar bear in Sydney harbour
Can Hannah help her new friend find his way back home?There is the obvious humour in the text – a polar bear in Sydney? – but the clever illustrations by Beck Feiner add another layer, as only Hannah can see the polar bear as they visit well known and beloved Sydney locations. Her parents don’t even notice the bear riding on the roof of their car!
Kids will love pointing out the absurdities in this gentle book that, below it’s humour, is a child-friendly invitation to consider some of the possible effects of climate change on the animals most affected.
The illustrations are stylised with gorgeous blocks of colour, portraying places like Bondi Beach, the Opera House and Sydney ferries, all very familiar to many Australian children.
The brief friendship that develops between Hannah and the bear is heart warming and Hannah is a clever girl to work out a solution to the polar bear’s dilemma.
The Polar Bear in Sydney Harbour is a welcome addition to picture books that introduce children to environmental themes, with humour and a child’s eye view throughout.
The Polar Bear in Sydney Harbour is published by HarperCollins Children’s Books in September 2020.
My thanks to the publishers for a copy to read and review.
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