Episódios
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In this episode, a conversation with Anna Downes, author of the crime novels The Safe Place, The Shadow House, and now, Red River Road.
In this new book, set on the Coral Coast of Western Australia, solo traveller Katy is on a mission to find her free-spirited sister, Phoebe, who disappeared along the same route a year ago. But as she drives her campervan further into the wild north, Katy realises she's not as alone as she'd first believed. Soon she is pulled into a complicated web of secrets, lies, myths and stories that force her to question everything she thought she knew about her sister.
Downes was joined in conversation by Kate Mildenhall, author of the acclaimed novels Skylarking, The Mother Fault, and The Hummingbird Effect. -
In this episode, a conversation with Manisha Anjali, a writer, artist, and teacher, and author of 'Naag Mountain'.
This book is a journey across oceans, from the Asian subcontinent to the South Seas, a journey about human trafficking on sugar plantations in Fiji and Australia. Anjali brings to life the histories and events, the stories and myths of a displaced and exploited people, that have been lost in time or forgotten or hidden from view.
Anjali was joined in conversation by Izzy Roberts-Orr, a poet, playwright, broadcaster, arts worker, and a Creative Producer with Red Room Poetry. -
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In this episode, a conversation with Ouyang Yu, author, translator, academic, and renowned poet.
Ouyang Yu’s first collection of stories in English, The White Cockatoo Flowers, is both assured and tender and at times surprisingly funny. It includes stories set in China and Australia that revel in the truth and candour of lived experience and the joys and constraints of language. In this book Ouyang Yu deftly peels back the layers on what it means to move from one culture to another, and what it means to be a writer, a husband, a parent and a stranger on foreign and familiar ground.
Ouyang Yu was joined in conversation by Alice Pung, a writer and editor whose books include the memoirs Unpolished Gem, Her Father's Daughter, and the novel Laurinda. -
In this episode, a conversation with Winnie Dunn – a Tongan-Australian writer, editor, the General Manager of Sweatshop Literacy Movement, and now author of the novel Dirt Poor Islanders.
Dunn’s book is a potent, mesmerising novel that opens our eyes to the brutal fractures navigated when growing up between two cultures and the importance of understanding all the many pieces of yourself.
Winnie Dunn was joined in conversation at Readings Carlton by Evelyn Araluen, poet and literary editor. Araluen’s first book, Dropbear, won the 2022 Stella Prize. -
In today’s episode, a conversation with Amanda Hampson, author of the runaway crime novel success, The Tea Ladies.
Hampson has returned with a sequel, The Cryptic Clue. It’s set in Zig Zag Lane, in the heart of Sydney's rag-trade district, where our intrepid tea ladies, Hazel, Betty and Irene, have their work cut out.
Solving a murder, kidnapping and arson case, and outwitting an arch criminal, earned them the respect of a local police officer. Now he needs their assistance to help solve a plot that threatens national security. -
In this episode, a conversation with award-winning writer Steven Carroll, author of Death of a Foreign Gentleman, the first book in a series of post-war literary crime novels featuring Detective Sergeant Stephen Minter.
Set in Cambridge in 1947, the book is a playful, poignant and absorbing novel, with shades of The Third Man and Brighton Rock, which examines the question of how to live a meaningful life in an indifferent, random, post-God world. -
A new instalment of the Readings Kids Podcast.
This episode features some of the members of the Readings Teen Advisory Board engaging in conversation with Tobias Madden, author of the books Anything But Fine and Take a Bow, Noah Mitchell. Madden’s third YA novel, Wrong Answers Only, was recently published in Australia. -
In this episode, a conversation with Victoria Vanstone, author of the new memoir, A Thousand Wasted Sundays. The book follows her journey from casual teen drinking to black-outs, boozed-up play dates to learning to live without her reliable social crutch.
But it’s not a tale of misery and trauma, it’s the relatable story of a very normal woman with a very ordinary, socially acceptable drinking habit – and how therapy, and the support of her husband and friends eventually lead her to lasting sobriety and a new perspective on life. -
In this episode, a conversation with author Sandra Goldbloom Zurbo, recorded live at the launch of her memoir, My Father’s Shadow.
Zurbo grew up in thrall to her father, a prominent antiwar activist, brilliant political organiser and covert member of the Communist Party. She adopted his beliefs from an early age, becoming a supporter of the Soviet Union and a peace campaigner. She travelled with him, meeting figures such as Indonesian president Sukarno, and greeted Paul Robeson and North Korean delegates with him at home. But her father could be withholding and difficult. He had a sharp backhand and was not always a faithful husband.
When Sandra entered adulthood and began to navigate a patriarchal world of work and relationships, she came to question aspects of her father’s worldview. As the communist ideals of the Left were tested and faltered over the Soviet Union, the mood of the times gradually shifted to embrace the counterculture. Sandra, living and working amid the swirl of Melbourne’s arts and political scenes, absorbed ideas about women, family and Jewish culture that often led to tense conversations with her father.
My Father’s Shadow is a portrait of life on the Left during a time of great social change. Lyrical, sharply observed and affecting, it is a candid exploration of the fraught dynamics between father and daughter – and, ultimately, the love that underlies them. -
An instalment of The Comics Question, a series where Bernard Caleo and I discuss comics, graphic novels, and all manner of illustrated books, zines, and other associated productions.
In this episode, Bernard Caleo was joined by Readings bookseller Nick Curnow to give a round-up of some of the most intriguing, beautiful, and thought-provoking comics and graphic novels from 2023. This is part two of two, so do check out the first instalment of this particular conversation. -
In this episode, a conversation with journalist and author Marina Kamenev, author of Kin: Family in the 21st Century.
While the nuclear family still exists, many more types of kinship surround us. Kin is an investigation into what influences us to have children and the new ways that have made parenthood possible. It delves into the experiences of couples without children, single parents by choice and rainbow families, and investigates the impacts of adoption, sperm donation, IVF and surrogacy, and the potential for a future of designer babies. Assisted reproductive technology has developed quickly, and the ways in which we think and speak about its implications — both legally and ethically — need to catch up.
This book is an incisive and powerful look at how families are created today, and how they might be created in the future. -
In this episode, a conversation with Samantha Harvey, author of Orbital. This is life on our planet as you’ve never seen it before: in this spellbinding and uplifting novel six astronauts rotate in the International Space Station. They are there to do vital work, but slowly they begin to wonder: what is life without earth? What is earth without humanity?
Together they watch their silent blue planet, circling it sixteen times, spinning past continents, and cycling through seasons, taking in glaciers and deserts, the peaks of mountains and the swells of oceans. The fragility of human life fills their conversations, their fears, their dreams. So far from earth, they have never felt more part - or protective - of it.
Samantha Harvey’s previous books include The Wilderness, All is Song, Dear Thief and The Western Wind and a work of non-fiction, The Shapeless Unease: A Year of Not Sleeping. Her work has been longlisted for the Booker Prize, and shortlisted for the James Tait Black Award, the Women's Prize, and the Guardian First Book Award. -
In this episode, a conversation with Mykaela Saunders, author of a new collection of short stories, ‘Always Will Be’.
Saunders is a Koori/Goori and Lebanese writer, teacher and researcher, and the editor of This All Come Back Now, the Aurealis Award-winning anthology of First Nations speculative fiction.
Saunders has been awarded numerous prizes for their writing, including the 2022 David Unaipon Award, and this most recent work draws from stories written from the past couple of years into a collection that poses the question: what might country, community and culture look like in the Tweed Valley if Gooris reasserted their sovereignty? -
An instalment of The Comics Question, a series where Bernard Caleo and I discuss comics, graphic novels, and all manner of illustrated books, zines, and other associated productions.
In this episode, Bernard Caleo was joined by Readings bookseller Nick Curnow to give a round-up of some of the most intriguing, beautiful, and thought-provoking comics and graphic novels from 2023.
This is part one of two, so do subscribe to be notified when the second instalment of this particular conversation is made available. -
In this episode, a conversation with Sonny Jane Wise, a trans, multiply neurodivergent & disabled public speaker, advocate and author.
Wise’s most recent book, We’re All Neurodiverse, is an affirming and thoughtful guide to how and why we need to fundamentally shift our thinking about neurodivergent people. Through interviews, narratives, and the lens of their own raw experiences, they consider how current systems and structures that impact neurodivergent people are rooted in outdated capitalist and racist frameworks, and how these need to change and adapt to be neurodiversity affirming.
Powerful and persuasive, this book is a clarion call for a kinder and more neurodiversity affirming society. -
In this episode, a conversation with the new Executive Director and CEO of Stella, Fiona Sweet.
Stella is a major voice for gender equality and cultural change in Australian literature. Founded in 2012, the organisation’s flagship program is the annual Stella Prize – a major literary award celebrating Australian women’s writing.
Stella also delivers a suite of year-round initiatives which actively champion Australian women writers, tackle gender bias in the literary sector, and connect outstanding books with readers. -
In this episode, a conversation with Jeanine Leane, Wiradjuri poet, writer and academic. Author of the acclaimed novel Purple Threads, winner of the David Unaipon Award, Leane’s poetry has also been widely awarded and commended across an extensive career as both a writer and a teacher.
Her newest book, the poetry collection Gawimarra: Gathering, moves from deeply tender meditations on Country, culture and kinship, to experimental archival poems dissecting the violence and destruction of the settler-colony. This special book is the result of decades of poetic, political, and cultural work and reflection. -
In this episode, a conversation with Alex and Stephanie Miller, discussing Miller’s most recent book, A Kind of Confession. The book is a secret look into Alex Miller's writing life, spanning sixty years of creativity and inspiration.
As a young man in 1961 Miller left his work as a ringer in Queensland and set out to achieve his dream of becoming a serious novelist. It was not until 1988 that his first novel, Watching the Climbers on the Mountain, was published. Twelve more novels would follow, all bestsellers, many published internationally. This selection from his notebooks and letters makes it exhilaratingly evident that Miller has been devoted to finding and telling stories that are profound, substantial and entertaining, stories that capture both intellect and emotion.
Miller's fascinating life is told in a personal, behind-the-scenes exploration of his struggle to become a published writer, his determination, his methods of creative thought and the sources of his inspiration. His writing, sometimes in anger and despair, sometimes with humour and joy, whether created for publication or for private meditation, is alive with ideas, moral choices, commentary, encouragement, criticism and love. -
In this episode, a conversation with Damien Linnane: writer, artist, and editor of Paper Chained, an art and writing magazine for prisoners. Linnane’s memoir Raw chronicles a childhood marred by physical and sexual abuse, and a man’s subsequent search for identity in unhealthy places, such as violent gangs and the military.
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In this episode, a conversation with Helen Hayward, academic, writer, and author of Home Work.
When Helen Hayward had her two children in London, 25 years ago, she found looking after them easy. Loving and looking after her kids was straightforward. However loving and looking after her home was not. She had long been instructed to put her career first. So she did. Yet what to do with the mushrooming laundry by the bathroom door? And what about if she actually liked cooking?
Home Work is a series of personal essays motivated by three questions. - Mostrar mais