Sydney Writers' Festival 2025

A symphony of alarm clocks at assembly? Yep, that was us. A plague of fluffy guinea pigs? It's next on our agenda.But for me, Cookie and Zeke, it’s about more than just fun. We're determined to make a difference. And when the adults won’t listen, we kids will find a way to be heard — as long as we can stay out of detention!The outrageous story of three best friends, one greedy mayor and a whole lot of pranking. Green Peas is our name and pranking's our game! No activist is too small, no prank too big... and things are about to get personal.

A group of housemates in Sydney’s inner city contend with gentrification, divisive politics, stalled careers, their own complicated privilege as second-generation Australians, and the evolving world of dating in this moving, funny, and stylish debut novel.Sydney’s inner city is very much its own place, yet also a stand-in for gentrifying inner-city suburbs the world over. Here, four young housemates struggle to untangle their complicated relationships while a poignant story of loss, grieving, and recovery unfolds.The nameless narrator of this story has recently lost her father and now her existence is split in two: she conjures the past in which he was alive and yet lives in the present, where he is not. To others, she appears to have it all together, but the grief she still feels creates an insurmountable barrier between herself and others, between the life she had and the one she leads.Wry, relatable, lyrical and beautifully told, Friends and Dark Shapes is a book about politics, desire, youth, relationships, and friends, and introduces a bold new Australian voice to American readers.

Twenty years ago, ornithology student Jessica Weston panicked when she heard a woman screaming for her life in the remote Barrington Tops. Her relief, when she discovers that it is a lyrebird making the sounds, is profound. She is thrilled to have caught his display on video. Then she remembers—lyrebirds are mimics. Whatever the wild creature has heard must have really happened, and happened nearby.Jessica takes her video to the police. Despite support from newly minted detective Megan Blaxland, with no missing person reported and no body, her evidence is ridiculed and dismissed.Twenty years later, a body is unearthed, just where Jessica said it would.Horrified that they let the case go cold, Jessica, now an associate professor, and Megan, recently retired but brought back to head up the investigation, reunite and join forces. They are determined to find the killer, whatever it takes. What they don't realise is that they are not just putting their lives in danger, but also the lives of those close to them...A sound froze her blood. A woman. A woman screaming in pure terror. Screaming and sobbing—begging—out here, in this desolate place.Lyrebirds are brilliant mimics, so if they mimic a woman screaming in terror and begging for her life, they have witnessed a crime. But how does a young, hung over PhD student and a wet-behind-the-ears new detective convince anyone that a native bird can be a reliable witness to a murder, especially when there is no body and no missing person? And what happens when they turn out to be right?Endorsements'Based on a mind-blowing and wholly unique premise, Lyrebird is a twisty thriller that will keep you in its grip until the last page.' — Joan Sauers, author of Echo Lake'I inhaled Lyrebird—it is such a compelling novel.' — Hannah Diviney, author of I'll Let Myself In'Unputdownable. A brilliant read from a wonderfully evocative, insightful writer.' — Lisa Wilkinson, journalist'Ripper story — couldn't put it down!' — Bryan Brown, actor and author of The Drowning'A fascinating, original mystery thriller.' — Malcolm Knox, author of The First Friend'No one writing in Australia is wiser... Jane Caro is a golden writer; she sees and expresses moments others do not. I would follow wherever she goes. And this book is no exception.' — Miriam Margolyes, actress and author of Oh Miriam!

Wishes can come true in the spooky seaside town of Elston-Fright but only if the mysterious Soul Spinners' Notes can be found. A spine-tingling adventure that answers all the questions that have been buzzing around Corpse, Girl and their friends.There are two things about the Soul Spinners' greatest creation on which everyone agrees - one, that the Notes have the power to grant a single wish, and two ... that the Notes are lost.When a ghost-eating wraith appears in the forgotten seaside town of Elston-Fright searching for the magical Notes, it's enough to make any kid ghost a bit nervous. Faye de Corail may have the townsfolk under her spell, but Girl, Corpse and their friends are determined to stay out of her way.After old foes resurface and a child is snatched, Girl and Corpse begin to piece together a sinister plan that not only threatens the lives of their friends, families and the people of Elston-Fright, it may send them all to Death Proper too.Somehow, at the heart of the mystery, lies the truth about both kid ghosts. Who are Girl and Corpse really? What is their connection to the lost Notes? And will they find answers before it's too late?The enchanting conclusion to the bestselling and highly acclaimed Elston-Fright Tales series.Endorsements'Imaginative and exciting.' — Judith Rossell, bestselling author of The Midwatch'Ghoulishly charming, with a compelling hero you will adore.' — Jessica Townsend, New York Times bestselling author of Nevermoor'Fizzes and crackles with magic, mystery and exactly the correct amount of huntsman spiders. I loved this book so much.' — Karen Foxlee, bestselling author of Dragon Skin'Wonderfully imaginative and enthralling.' — Jaclyn Moriarty, award-winning author of the Kingdoms and Empires series'An intriguing story lavishly layered with magic, mystery and secrets to uncover.' — Richard Pritchard, bestselling co-creator of the Wylah the Koorie Warrior series'Beautifully original ... kept me up until the witching hour.' — Amelia Mellor, bestselling author of The Grandest Bookshop in the World

In Peter Beinart’s view, one story has long dominated Jewish communal life: that of persecution and victimhood. It is a story that erases much of the nuance of sacred Jewish tradition and history and warps our understanding of modern history. After Gaza, where Jewish texts, history, and language have been deployed to justify mass slaughter and starvation, he argues, Jews must tell a new story. After this war, whose horror will echo for generations, they must do nothing less than offer a new answer to the question: What does it mean to be a Jew?Beinart imagines an alternate story that would draw on other nations’ efforts at moral reconstruction and a different reading of Jewish history. It is a story in which Jews have the right to equality, not supremacy, and in which Jewish and Palestinian safety are not mutually exclusive but intertwined. It envisions a world that recognizes the infinite value of all human life, beginning in the Gaza Strip.Being Jewish After the Destruction of Gaza is a provocative and fearless argument that will expand and inform one of the defining conversations of our time. It is a book that only Peter Beinart could write: a passionate yet measured work that brings together his personal experience, his commanding grasp of history, his keen understanding of political and moral nuance, and a clear vision for the future.A bold, urgent appeal from the acclaimed columnist and political commentator, addressing one of the most important issues of our time

The world is in the grip of climate catastrophe. Sydney has been transformed by rising sea levels, soaring temperatures and increasingly intense social division and unrest.When a child on the margins goes missing from the area of the city known as the Floodline, Senior Detective Sadiya Azad is assigned to find her. But when a woman's body is found not far from where the girl disappeared she stumbles into a web of lies and corruption.With only days until a deadly storm strikes the city, Sadiya and her partner Detective Sergeant Paul Findlay find themselves locked in a desperate race against time.Chilling and utterly compelling, Landfall is crime writing at its best — and a terrifying vision of the future bearing down on us.EndorsementsThe new thriller from "Australia's literary Nostradamus" — The Weekend Australian

England, 1979. Vincent, Lawrence and William are the last remaining residents of a secluded New Forest home, part of the government's Sycamore Scheme. Every day, the triplets do their chores, play their games and take their medicine, under the watchful eyes of three Mother Morning, Mother Afternoon and Mother Night.Their nightmares are recorded in The Book of Dreams.Their lessons are taken from The Book of Knowledge.And their sins are reported in The Book of Guilt.All the boys want is to be sent to the Big House in Margate, where they imagine a life of sun, sea and fairground rides. But, as the government looks to shut down the Sycamore Homes, the triplets begin to question everything they have been told.Gradually surrendering its dark secrets, The Book of Guilt is a profoundly unnerving exploration of belonging in a world where some lives are valued less than others.

Adrift in outer space, a motley crew of human-made objects tell their tales, making real history sweeter and stranger. Starman, a lovelorn mannequin orbiting the Sun in his cherry-red car, pines for his creator. The first sculpture ever taken to the Moon is possessed by the spirit of Neil Armstrong. The International Space Station, awaiting deorbit and burial in a spacecraft cemetery beneath the ocean, farewells its last astronauts. A team of tamponauts sets off on a perilous mission to Mars inspired by the courage of their predecessors. The Voyager 1 space probe — carrying its precious Golden Record — is captured by Oortians near the edge of the solar system and drawn into their baroque, glimmering rituals. By turns joyous and mournful, these object-astronauts are not high priests of the universe but something a little... weirder. From their inverted perspectives, they observe humans both intimately and from a great distance, bearing witness to a civilisation unable to live up to its own ideals. And yet each still finds in our planet — in their humans — something worthy of love.

Welcome to Buenos Aires, a city thrumming with murderous intentions and morbid desires, where missing children come back from the dead and unearthed bones carry terrible curses. These brilliant, unsettling tales of revenge, witchcraft, fetishes, disappearances, and urban madness spill over with women and girls whose dark inclinations will lead them over the edge.EndorsementsMariana Enríquez is a mesmerizing writer who demands to be read. Like Bolaño, she is interested in matters of life and death, and her fiction hits with the full force of a train. — Dave Eggers

A class of teenage girls from an elite private girls' school go on a camping trip into the Australian bush. Four of the girls - a girl gang, a group of best friends dubbed 'The Cins' by the teachers - become separated from the main group. A male teacher volunteers to look for them.None of the five come back.A major search immediately gets underway. Days crawl past, agonisingly, with no sign of the girls or their teacher. The Principal of the school, godmother to one of the missing students, is desperately trying to hold the parents, the school community - and herself - together. She needs to find out what happened before the police do. Finally, separated and traumatised, the four girls re-appear. But the male teacher does not.And The Cins aren't talking.Wing is unforgettable. An immersive, propulsive, headlong, heart-rush of a read. Provocative, sharp, bristling with intent, it is both raging and tender. A novel about the fault lines in female friendships. Between mothers and daughters. Between older and younger generations. And of course, between men and women. It is a novel that meets its times head on, with great power, honesty and urgency.

When she turned ninety, my mother sprang a final surprise on us. She started speaking in the voice of a stranger.Peter’s mother is dying. Born in England and having spent most of her adult life as a doctor in Zimbabwe, she now lies on a hospital bed in the partitioned living room of his sister’s London apartment, her accent having overnight become posher than the Queen’s. Unsentimental, fiercely stubborn and at times hilarious, she finally drops her guard, losing all fear of conflict to become the family provocateur.While confronting the revelations of what his family was – and wasn’t – and the stoicism that sometimes threatened to destroy them, Peter also mourns the ending of his long marriage. At this point of rupture and healing, Peter reflects on his family’s legacy of exile and their tenuous hold on home.In Exit A Story of Love, Loss and Occasional Wars, Peter Godwin considers, with both tenderness and candour, the life of émigrés, exiles and refugees, and grieves the many losses that make life both magnificent and unbearable. He brings us into the spaces that make us question, suffer and celebrate the relationships we have among family and friends, and the healing of our own wounds.

'In my brief breath of life, might I find a way to fit light to paper?'In a land of ethereal beauty, within a culture soaked in myth, a young woman discovers the story that will change her life.In 2003, seventeen-year-old Australian exchange student Hannah Kent arrives at Keflavík Airport in the middle of the Icelandic winter.That night she sleeps off her jet lag and bewilderment in the National Archives of Iceland, unaware that, years later, she will return to the same building to write Burial Rites, the haunting story of Agnes Magnúsdóttir, the last woman executed in Iceland.Always Home, Always Homesick is Hannah Kent's exquisite love letter to a land that has forged a nation of storytellers, her ode to the transcendent power of creativity, and her invitation to us all to join her in the realms of mystery, spirit and wonder.

Anna has a life to envy. An apartment in New York. A well-meaning (too well-meaning?) partner. And a high-flying job in beauty PR.Who wouldn’t want all that? Anna — it turns out.Turning a minor mid-life crisis into a major life event she bins the lot, heads back to Ireland, and gets a PR job for a super-high-end coastal retreat.Tougher than it sounds. Newsflash: the locals hate it.So much so, there have been threats — and violence.Anna, however, worked in the beauty industry.There’s no ugliness she hasn’t seen. No wrinkle she can’t smooth over.Anna’s got this.Until she discovers that leaving New York doesn’t mean escaping her mistakes.Once upon a time she'd had a best friend.Once upon a time she'd loved a man.Now she has neither.And now she has to face them.Anna has just lost her taste for the Big Apple… We all make mistakes. But when do we stop making the same one over and over again?Endorsements'Sensitive, funny, wonderful, immensely touching' — Nigella Lawson'Delightfully funny' — Daily Telegraph'Funny, tender, completely absorbing!' — Graham Norton'An entertaining, growingly poignant contemporary tale' — Sunday Times'Funny, heartbreaking, achingly real' — Jane Fallon'Beautifully written, funny, heartbreaking and always wise - a proper treat' — Daily Mail

When you live in a house with four other people, some fool is always going to come along and ruin things for you.A Valentine's Day dance at Greg's school has turned his world upside down.As Greg scrambles to find a date, he's worried he'll be left out in the cold on the big night. His best friend, Rowley, doesn't have any prospects either, but that's small consolation.Then an unexpected twist gives Greg a partner for the dance and leaves Rowley the odd man out. But a lot can happen in one night, and in the end, you never know who's going to be lucky in love...Join Greg Heffley in the seventh book in Jeff Kinney's hilarious Diary of a Wimpy Kid series! Love is in the air, but what does that mean for Greg Heffley?Endorsements'The world has gone crazy for Jeff Kinney's Diary of a Wimpy Kid' — The Sun'Kinney is right up there with J.K. Rowling as one of the bestselling children's authors on the planet' — Independent'Hilarious' — TelegraphWinner of Blue Peter's Best Book of the Last 10 Years award.

'Her self is an illusion yet it is one beloved by most everyone who has heard her speak . . . She is thirty-three years old and there is no one else in the world who knows who she used to be.'The motherless child of an English priest living in ninth-century Mainz, Agnes is a wild and brilliant girl with a deep, visceral love of God. At eighteen, to avoid a future as a wife or nun, Agnes enlists the help of a lovesick Benedictine monk to disguise herself as a man and devote her life to the study she is denied as a woman.So begins the life of John — the matchless scholar and scribe of the revered Fulda monastery, then a charismatic heretic in an Athens commune and, by her middle years, a celebrated teacher in Rome.There, Agnes (as John) dazzles the Church hierarchy with her knowledge and wisdom and finds herself at the heart of political intrigue in a city where gossip is a powerful—and deadly—currency.And when the only person who knows her identity arrives in Rome, she will risk everything to once again feel what it is to be known—and loved.Rapture is an astonishing, transformative and audacious novel that confirms Emily Maguire as one of our finest writers.

Madeline is a force to be reckoned with. She’s funny, biting, and passionate; she remembers everything and forgives no one. Celeste is the kind of beautiful woman who makes the world stop and stare but she is paying a price for the illusion of perfection. New to town, single mom Jane is so young that another mother mistakes her for a nanny. She comes with a mysterious past and a sadness beyond her years. These three women are at different crossroads, but they will all wind up in the same shocking place.Big Little Lies is a brilliant take on ex-husbands and second wives, mothers and daughters, schoolyard scandal, and the little lies that can turn lethal.A murder...A tragic accident...Or just parents behaving badly? What’s indisputable is that someone is dead.

John Rebus spent his life as a detective putting Edinburgh's most deadly criminals behind bars. Now, he's going to join them...In this tense, gripping game of cat and mouse, Rankin returns to his much-loved creation, the inimitable John Rebus, as he faces a case unlike any other...Praise for Ian RankinEndorsements'Ian Rankin is a genius' — Lee Child'Rebus is one of British crime writing's greatest alongside Holmes, Poirot and Morse' — Daily Mail'Whatever he writes, it will be worth reading... Rankin has redefined the genre' — Guardian'The arrival of a Rankin novel remains one of life's pleasures' — Express'Rankin is a phenomenon' — Spectator'Worthy of Agatha Christie at her best' — Scotsman'The king of crime fiction' — Sunday Express'Great fiction, full stop' — The Times

Eilis Lacey is Irish, married to Tony Fiorello, a plumber and one of four Italian American brothers, all of whom live in neighboring houses on a cul-de-sac in Lindenhurst, Long Island, with their wives and children and Tony’s parents, a huge extended family that lives and works, eats and plays together. It is the spring of 1976 and Eilis, now in her forties with two teenage children, has no one to rely on in this still-new country. Though her ties to Ireland remain stronger than those that hold her to her new land and home, she has not returned in decades.One day, when Tony is at his job and Eilis is in her home office doing her accounting, an Irishman comes to the door asking for her by name. He tells her that his wife is pregnant with Tony’s child and that when the baby is born, he will not raise it but instead deposit it on Eilis’s doorstep. It is what Eilis does—and what she refuses to do—in response to this stunning news that makes Tóibín’s novel so riveting.Long Island is about longings unfulfilled, even unrecognized. The silences in Eilis’ life are thunderous and dangerous, and there’s no one more deft than Tóibín at giving them language. This is a gorgeous story of a woman alone in a marriage and the deepest bonds she rekindles on her return to the place and people she left behind, to ways of living and loving she thought she’d lost.A spectacularly moving and intense novel of secrecy, misunderstanding, and love, the story of Eilis Lacey, the complex and enigmatic heroine of Brooklyn, Tóibín’s most popular work twenty years later.EndorsementsFrom the beloved, critically acclaimed New York Times bestselling author.

The death of Winnie Madikizela Mandela on 2 April this year unleashed a hailstorm of opinion. On one side, the media and public cast her legacy in the shadow of her sanctified ex-husband: Winnie was history's loser, damaged goods; Nelson Mandela was whole and pure. A younger generation — in particular women — took a different view, and a battle of ideas began to reframe Winnie's career and reclaim her identity as an extraordinary woman and fierce political activist. Sisonke Msimang, an acclaimed author and public commentator, wasted little time in entering the fray. When the dust settled, what emerged was this short but razor-sharp book, a critical reflection on Winnie's turbulent yet remarkable life. Msimang situates her political career and legacy in the contemporary context, exploring what she means today in social and political terms by examining different aspects of her iconic persona. The Resurrection of Winnie Mandela is an astute examination of one of South Africa's most controversial political figures — the rise and fall — and rise again — of a woman who not only battled the apartheid regime but also the patriarchal character of the struggle itself. In telling Winnie's story, Msimang shows that activism matters and that the meaning of women's lives can be reclaimed.

Marnie is stuck. Stuck working alone in her London flat, stuck battling the long afternoons and a life that increasingly feels like it's passing her by.Michael is coming undone. Reeling from his wife's departure, increasingly reclusive, taking himself on long, solitary walks across the moors and fells.When a persistent mutual friend and some very English weather conspire to bring them together, Marnie and Michael suddenly find themselves alone on the most epic of walks and on the precipice of a new friendship.But can it survive the journey?A new love story by beloved bestseller David Nicholls, You Are Here is a novel of first encounters, second chances and finding the way home.

On a summer's day in 1596, a young girl in Stratford-upon-Avon takes to her bed with a sudden fever. Her twin brother, Hamnet, searches everywhere for help. Why is nobody at home?Their mother, Agnes, is over a mile away, in the garden where she grows medicinal herbs. Their father is working in London.Neither parent knows that Hamnet will not survive the week.Hamnet is a novel inspired by the son of a famous playwright: a boy whose life has been all but forgotten, but whose name was given to one of the most celebrated plays ever written.Two extraordinary people. A love that draws them together. A loss that threatens to tear them apart.EndorsementsWinner of the 2020 Women's Prize for Fiction"Richly sensuous... something special" — The Sunday Times"A thing of shimmering wonder" — David Mitchell

For the past decade, Lemn Sissay has composed a short poem as dawn breaks each morning. Life-affirming, witty and full of wonder, these poems chronicle his own battle with the dark and are fuelled by resilience and defiant joy. Let the Light Pour In is a collection of the best of these poems, and a book celebrating this morning practice.‘How do you do it?’ said night‘How do you wake up and shine?’‘I keep it simple,’ said light‘One day at a time’EndorsementsThe instant Sunday Times bestsellerA New Statesman book of the yearA Sainsbury's Magazine book to gift

A house is a precious thing...It is 1961 and the rural Dutch province of Overijssel is quiet. Bomb craters have been filled, buildings reconstructed, and the war is truly over. Living alone in her late mother’s country home, Isabel knows her life is as it should be—led by routine and discipline. But all is upended when her brother Louis brings his graceless new girlfriend Eva, leaving her at Isabel’s doorstep as a guest, to stay for the season.Eva is Isabel’s antithesis: she sleeps late, walks loudly through the house, and touches things she shouldn’t. In response, Isabel develops a fury-fueled obsession, and when things start disappearing around the house—a spoon, a knife, a bowl—Isabel’s suspicions begin to spiral. In the sweltering peak of summer, Isabel’s paranoia gives way to infatuation—leading to a discovery that unravels all Isabel has ever known. The war might not be well and truly over after all, and neither Eva—nor the house in which they live—are what they seem.An exhilarating, twisted tale of desire, suspicion, and obsession between two women staying in the same house in the Dutch countryside during the summer of 1961—a powerful exploration of the legacy of WWII and the darker parts of our collective past. Mysterious, sophisticated, sensual, and infused with intrigue, atmosphere, and sex, The Safekeep is a brilliantly plotted and provocative debut novel you won’t soon forget.

1975 is a time of change in America. The Vietnam War is ending. Muhammad Ali is fighting Joe Frazier. And in the small town of Monta Clare, Missouri, girls are disappearing.When the daughter of a wealthy family is targeted, the most unlikely hero emerges—Patch, a local boy with one eye, who saves the girl, and, in doing so, leaves heartache in his wake.Patch and those who love him soon discover that the line between triumph and tragedy has never been finer and that their search for answers will lead them to truths that could mean losing one another.A missing-person mystery, a serial-killer thriller, a love story — with a unique twist on each. Chris Whitaker has written a novel about what lurks in the shadows of obsession, and the blinding light of hope.From the New York Times bestselling author of We Begin at the End comes a soaring thriller and an epic love story that spans decades.Endorsements“Impeccably crafted, deeply emotional, entirely shattering. I was captivated from page one.” — Bonnie Garmus

This is the story of Jeanette, adopted and brought up by her mother as one of God's elect. Zealous and passionate, she seems destined for life as a missionary, but then she falls for one of her converts.At sixteen, Jeanette decides to leave the church, her home and her family, for the young woman she loves. Innovative, punchy and tender, Oranges Are Not the Only Fruit is a few days' ride into the bizarre outposts of religious excess and human obsession.

What happens when the Zusaks open their family home to three big, wild, pound-hardened dogs — Reuben, a wolf at your door with a hacksaw; Archer, blond, beautiful, deadly; and the rancorously smiling Frosty, who walks like a rolling thunderstorm?The answer can only be: there are street fights, park fights, public shamings, property trashing, bodily injuries, stomach pumping, purest comedy, shocking tragedy, and carnage that needs to be seen to be believed — not to mention the odd police visit at some ungodly hour of the morning.There is a reckoning of shortcomings and failure, a strengthening of will, but most important of all, an explosion of love and the joy and recognition of family.From one of the world's great storytellers comes a tender, motley and exquisitely written memoir about the human need for both connection and disorder; it is also a love letter to the animals who bring hilarity and beauty, but also the visceral truth of the natural world, straight to our doors and into our lives, and change us forever.There's a madman dog beside me, and the hounds of memory ahead of us. It's love and beasts and wild mistakes, and regret, but never to change things ...

In Always Was, Always Will Be, bestselling author Thomas Mayo investigates 'what's next?' for reconciliation and justice in Australia after the failed October 2023 Voice to Parliament referendum.Since the referendum, supporters and volunteers have been asking for guidance as to how to continue to support Indigenous recognition. Mayo, a leader of the Yes 23 campaign and co-author of the bestselling The Voice to Parliament Handbook, has penned a new book to answer that question.On writing the book, Mayo said, "The book starts with the ingredients for hope; it will cover the lessons from the past, and ultimately, Always Was, Always Will Be is about the future we want to see — one where there is justice for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people."Always Was, Always Will Be is essential reading for those who want to keep the positive momentum going and the number of allies growing. It is for Indigenous and non-Indigenous people who are ready to do everything they can to close the gap. For the thousands of people who have been feeling sad, empty and powerless since last October, Always Was, Always Will Be aims to be a positive rallying cry. This book will map the path toward next steps on how to create a fairer Australia.

Welcome to Argentina and the fascinating, frightening, fantastical imagination of Mariana Enriquez. In twelve spellbinding new stories, Enriquez writes about ordinary people, especially women, whose lives turn inside out when they encounter terror, the surreal, and the supernatural. A neighborhood nuisanced by ghosts, a family whose faces melt away, a faded hotel haunted by a girl who dissolved in the water tank on the roof, a riverbank populated by birds that used to be women—these and other tales illuminate the shadows of contemporary life, where the line between good and evil no longer exists.Lyrical and hypnotic, heart-stopping and deeply moving, Enriquez’s stories never fail to enthrall, entertain, and leave us shaken. Translated by the award-winning Megan McDowell, A Sunny Place for Shady People showcases Enriquez’s unique blend of the literary and the horrific.On the shores of this river, all the birds that fly, drink, perch on branches, and disturb siestas with the demonic squawking of the possessed—all those birds were once women. A diabolical collection of stories featuring achingly human characters whose lives intertwine with ghosts, goblins, and the macabre.Endorsements“One of Latin America’s most exciting authors.” — Silvia Moreno-Garcia“The most exciting discovery I’ve made in fiction for some time.” — Kazuo Ishiguro, winner of the Nobel Prize for Literature

A boy meets a girl. The past meets the future. A finger meets a trigger. The beginning meets the end. England is forever. England must fall.In the near future, a disaffected civil servant is offered a lucrative job in a mysterious new government ministry gathering 'expats' from across history to test the limits of time-travel.Her role is to work as a 'bridge': living with, assisting and monitoring the expat known as '1847' - Commander Graham Gore. As far as history is concerned, Commander Gore died on Sir John Franklin's doomed expedition to the Arctic, so he's a little disoriented to find himself alive and surrounded by outlandish concepts such as 'washing machine', 'Spotify' and 'the collapse of the British Empire'. With an appetite for discovery and a seven-a-day cigarette habit, he soon adjusts; and during a long, sultry summer he and his bridge move from awkwardness to genuine friendship, to something more.But as the true shape of the project that brought them together begins to emerge, Gore and the bridge are forced to confront their past choices and imagined futures. Can love triumph over the structures and histories that have shaped them? And how do you defy history when history is living in your house?

Did I have a grievance? Most of us, without looking far, could find something that had harmed us, and oppressed us, and unfairly held us back. I tried not to dwell on it, thought it healthier not to, though I’d lived my short life so far in a chaos of privilege and prejudice.Dave Win, the son of a British dressmaker and a Burmese man he’s never met, is thirteen years old when he gets a scholarship to a top boarding school. With the doors of elite English society cracked open for him, heady new possibilities lie before Dave, even as he is exposed to the envy and viciousness of his wealthy classmates, above all that of Giles Hadlow, whose worldly parents sponsored the scholarship and who find in Dave someone they can more easily nurture than their brutish son.Our Evenings follows Dave from the 1960s on—through the possibilities that remained open for him, and others that proved to be illusory: as a working-class brown child in a decidedly white institution; a young man discovering queer culture and experiencing his first, formative love affairs; a talented but often overlooked actor, on the road with an experimental theater company; and an older Londoner whose late-in-life marriage fills his days with an unexpected sense of happiness and security.Moving in and out of Dave’s orbit are the Hadlows. Estranged from his parents, who remain close to Dave, Giles directs his privilege into a career as a powerful right-wing politician, whose reactionary vision for England pokes perilous holes in Dave’s stability. And as the novel accelerates towards the present day, the two men’s lives and values will finally collide in a cruel shock of violence.Sweeping readers from our past to our present through the beauty, pain, and joy of one deeply observed life.EndorsementsFrom the internationally acclaimed winner of the Booker Prize.“One of our most gifted writers” — The Boston Globe.

There are two things that I can simply not tolerate: feminists and margarine.Gourmet cook Manako Kajii sits in Tokyo Detention Center convicted of the serial murders of lonely businessmen, whom she is said to have seduced with her delicious home cooking. The case has captured the nation’s imagination but Kajii refuses to speak with the press, entertaining no visitors. That is, until journalist Rika Machida writes a letter asking for her recipe for beef stew, and Kajii can’t resist writing back.Rika, the only woman in her news office, works late each night, rarely cooking more than ramen. As the visits unfold between her and the steely Kajii, they are closer to a masterclass in food than journalistic research. Rika hopes this gastronomic exchange will help her soften Kajii, but it seems that she might be the one changing. With each meal she eats, something is awakening in her body. Might she and Kajii have more in common than she once thought?Inspired by the real case of the convicted con woman and serial killer, "The Konkatsu Killer," Asako Yuzuki’s Butter is a vivid, unsettling exploration of misogyny, obsession, romance and the transgressive pleasures of food in Japan.

Burnt out and in need of retreat, a middle-aged woman leaves Sydney to return to the place she grew up, taking refuge in a small religious community hidden away on the stark plains of the Australian outback. She doesn't believe in God, or know what prayer is, and finds herself living this strange, reclusive existence almost by accident.But disquiet interrupts this secluded life with three visitations. First comes a terrible mouse plague, each day signalling a new battle against the rising infestation. Second is the return of the skeletal remains of a sister who disappeared decades before, presumed murdered. And finally, a troubling visitor plunges the narrator further back into her past.

Helen Garner is best known for her intricate portraits of ordinary people in difficult times.In The Season, she trains her keen, journalistic eye on the most difficult time of adolescence.The Season finds Garner and her grandson Amby deep in the throes of a mutual obsession with Australian football—or “footy”—as Amby joins his local club team. From her trademark remove, Garner documents the camaraderie and the competition: the way Amby hangs his head in shame after a botched kick, or admits he tries to "do cool things" when he knows Garner is watching, hoping it will wind up in her book.The Season is part dispatch on boyhood, documenting the tenderness between young men that so often scurries away under too bright a spotlight, and part love letter to parenthood, as Garner finds herself enmeshed in the community that gathers to watch their boys do battle. Here we find Garner living the best years of her life, utterly content and unafraid to bask in it — a bright, generously funny, escapist book from one of our great living writers.From the beloved master of Australian letters Helen Garner comes a brand new work of nonfiction, exploring boyhood, football, and the quotidian joys of being a grandparent.Endorsements"prodigiously gifted" — New York Times Book Review"ordinary people in difficult times" — New York Times

In this collection of one novel and three novellas, Torrey Peters pushes trans-genre to its limits to explore who gets included—and excluded—from the possibilities of gender.In Stag Dance, this collection’s titular novel, a Paul Bunyan-type lumberjack working an illegal winter logging outfit recounts how the lonely woodsmen entertain themselves with a dance at which some of the loggers must volunteer to attend as women. Obsession, repressed desires, and betrayal lead up to the big night, as the lumberjack grows increasingly jealous of Lisen, the prettiest young man in camp, weaving a surreal tall tale that questions the nature of transition.Three equally visionary novellas surround Stag Dance. In Infect Your Friends and Loved Ones, Peters imagines a sci-fi future in which everyone must choose their own gender—the vengeful consequence of a rogue trio of charismatic trans women who destroy civilization as we know it. In The Chaser, a secret romance between roommates at a Quaker boarding school brings out intrigue and cruelty. In the last novella, The Masker, a party weekend on the Las Vegas strip turns horrific when a young crossdresser must choose between a handsome mystery man who objectifies her in thrilling ways and a cynical veteran trans woman offering unglamorous sisterhood.Radical, witty, and gripping, these four narratives coalesce to form a portrait of identity-in-crisis that unsettles and delights.

It's 412 BC, and Athens' invasion of Sicily has failed catastrophically. Thousands of Athenian soldiers are held captive in the quarries of Syracuse, starving, dejected and hanging on by the slimmest of threads.Lampo and Gelon are local potters, young men with no work and barely two obols to rub together. With not much to fill their time, they take to visiting the nearby quarry, where they discover prisoners who will, in desperation, recite lines from the plays of Euripides in return for scraps of bread and a scattering of olives.And so an idea is born: the men will put on Medea in the quarry. A proper performance to be sung of down the ages. Because after all, you can hate the Athenians for invading your territory, but still love their poetry.But as the performance draws near and the audacity of their enterprise dawns on them, it becomes difficult to distinguish between enemies and friends. And Lampo, whose ambitions have never stretched beyond having enough coin for the next jug of wine, finds his aspirations elevated, his heart entangled and his courage tested in ways he could never have imagined.Glorious Exploits is an exhilarating and fiercely original story of brotherhood, war and art; and — in the face of the Gods' apparent indifference — of daring to dream of something bigger than ourselves.Endorsements'Bold and totally unexpected, I loved this book' — Douglas Stuart, author of Shuggie Bain'A very special, very clever, very entertaining novel' — Roddy Doyle, author of Paddy Clarke, Ha Ha Ha'Madly ambitious, cathartic like all great tragedy, but shockingly funny too, Ferdia Lennon's outstandingly original début is just glorious' — Emma Donoghue, author of Room

Dolly Maunder was born at the end of the nineteenth century, when society’s long-locked doors were starting to creak ajar for women.Growing up in a poor farming family in country New South Wales, Dolly—clever, energetic and determined—spent her restless life pushing at those doors.Most women like her have disappeared from view, remembered only in family photo albums as remote figures in impossible clothes, or maybe for a lemon-pudding recipe handed down through the generations. Restless Dolly Maunder brings one of these women to life as someone we can recognise and whose struggles we can empathise with.In this compelling novel, Kate Grenville uses family memories to imagine her way into the life of her grandmother. This is the story of a woman, working her way through a world of limits and obstacles, who was able—if at a cost—to make a life she could call her own. Her battles and triumphs helped to open doors for the women who came after.

Amid a series of personal disasters, Aliyah and her daughter, Sakina, retreat to rural NSW to make a new life. Aliyah manages to secure a run-down property and hires a farmhand, Shep, an extremely private Palestinian man and the region’s imām.During a storm, she drives past the town’s river and happens upon a childhood friend, Hana, who has been living a life of desperation. Aliyah takes her in and tries to navigate the indefinable relationships between both Hana and her farmhand. Tensions rise as Aliyah’s devotion to Hana is strained by her growing bond with Shep.Finally, all are thrown together for a reckoning alongside Hana’s brother, Hashim, and Aliyah’s confidante, Billie — a local Kamilaroi midwife she met working at the hospital — while bushfires rage around them.

A slender novel of epic power and the winner of the Booker Prize 2024, Orbital deftly snapshots one day in the lives of six women and men traveling through space. Selected for one of the last space station missions of its kind before the program is dismantled, these astronauts and cosmonauts—from America, Russia, Italy, Britain, and Japan—have left their lives behind to travel at a speed of over seventeen thousand miles an hour as the earth reels below. We glimpse moments of their earthly lives through brief communications with family, their photos and talismans; we watch them whip up dehydrated meals, float in gravity-free sleep, and exercise in regimented routines to prevent atrophying muscles; we witness them form bonds that will stand between them and utter solitude. Most of all, we are with them as they behold and record their silent blue planet. Their experiences of sixteen sunrises and sunsets and the bright, blinking constellations of the galaxy are at once breathtakingly awesome and surprisingly intimate.Profound and contemplative, Orbital is a moving elegy to our environment and planet.