Brisbane Houses with Gardens FIRST EDITION by Beth Wilson

$39.99 AUD

Category: Fiction

For decades now, Beth Wilson has been collecting material for her book Brisbane Houses with Gardens ... an unprecedented history of the Brisbane domestic landscape from pre-1823 to the present day. Drawing on her extraordinary knowledge of horticulture, her 50 years’ experience as a land scape architect working on some of Brisbane’s leading projects, a lifetime’s interest in historic gardens, and the extensive 120-year-old archives of Wilson Architects, Beth has brought together a fascinating and revealing history of the city through the evolution of its homes and gardens. ...Show more

Where the Crawdads Sing by Delia Owens

$22.99 AUD

Category: International Fiction | Reading Level: Adult

#1 New York Times Bestseller A Reese Witherspoon Hello Sunshine Book Club Pick   "I can't even express how much I love this book I didn't want this story to end " - Reese Witherspoon   "Painfully beautiful." - The New York Times Book Review   "Perfect for fans of Barbara Kingsolver." - Bu stle   For years, rumors of the "Marsh Girl" have haunted Barkley Cove, a quiet town on the North Carolina coast. So in late 1969, when handsome Chase Andrews is found dead, the locals immediately suspect Kya Clark, the so-called Marsh Girl. But Kya is not what they say. Sensitive and intelligent, she has survived for years alone in the marsh that she calls home, finding friends in the gulls and lessons in the sand. Then the time comes when she yearns to be touched and loved. When two young men from town become intrigued by her wild beauty, Kya opens herself to a new life - until the unthinkable happens.   Perfect for fans of Barbara Kingsolver and Karen Russell, Where the Crawdads Sing is at once an exquisite ode to the natural world, a heartbreaking coming-of-age story, and a surprising tale of possible murder. Owens reminds us that we are forever shaped by the children we once were, and that we are all subject to the beautiful and violent secrets that nature keeps. ...Show more

Apeirogon by Colum McCann

$29.99 AUD

Category: International Fiction

A NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLERA BBC BOOK OF 2020CHOSEN AS A BOOK OF THE YEAR BY THE SUNDAY TIMES, OBSERVER, GUARDIAN, i PAPER, FINANCIAL TIMES, NEW STATESMAN, SCOTSMAN, IRISH TIMES, BBC.COM, WATERSTONES.COM'You have to read Apeirogon' Sunday Times'Nothing like any book you've ever read' MICHAEL CUNNINGHAM' An essential hymn to peace and forgiveness' independent.co.ukThe novel of a lifetime about two men and their daughters: divided by conflict, yet united in grief.Rami Elhanan and Bassam Aramin live near one another – yet they exist worlds apart. Rami is Israeli. Bassam is Palestinian. Rami's license plate is yellow. Bassam's license plate is green. It takes Rami fifteen minutes to drive to the West Bank. The same journey for Bassam takes an hour and a half. Both men have lost their daughters. Rami's thirteen-year-old girl Smadar was killed by a suicide bomber while out shopping with her friends. Bassam's ten-year-old daughter Abir was shot and killed by a member of the border police outside her school. There was a candy bracelet in her pocket she hadn't had time to eat yet. The men become the best of friends. In this epic novel – named for a shape with a countably infinite number of sides – Colum McCann crosses centuries and continents, stitching time, art, history, nature and politics into a tapestry of friendship, love, loss and belonging. Musical, muscular, delicate and soaring, Apeirogon is the novel for our times.   ...Show more

Sticks and Stones by Katherine Firkin

$32.99 AUD

Category: Crime Fiction

'He didn't have to be normal, the boy realised. He just had to pretend.' It's winter in Melbourne and Detective Emmett Corban is starting to regret his promotion to head of the Missing Persons Unit, as the routine reports pile up on his desk. So when Natale Gibson goes missing, he's convinced this is t he big case he's been waiting for - the woman's husband and parents insist the devoted mother would never abandon her children, and her personal accounts remain untouched. But things aren't all they seem. The close-knit Italian family is keeping secrets - none bigger than the one Natale has been hiding. Just as the net seems to be tightening, the investigation is turned on its head. The body of a woman is found . . . then another. What had seemed like a standard missing person's case has turned into a frightening hunt for a serial killer, and time is running out. But to really understand these shocking crimes, Emmett and his team will need to delve back through decades of neglect - back to a squalid inner-city flat, where a young boy is left huddling over his mother's body . . .   ...Show more

The Mirror And The Light by Hilary Mantel

$45.00 AUD

Category: Historical Fiction | Series: The Wolf Hall Trilogy | Reading Level: very good

The long-awaited sequel to Wolf Hall and Bring Up the Bodies, the stunning conclusion to Hilary Mantel’s Man Booker Prize-winning Thomas Cromwell trilogy. ‘If you cannot speak truth at a beheading, when can you speak it?’ England, May 1536. Anne Boleyn is dead, decapitated in the space of a heartbeat by a hired French executioner. As her remains are bundled into oblivion, Thomas Cromwell breakfasts with the victors. The blacksmith’s son from Putney emerges from the spring’s bloodbath to continue his climb to power and wealth, while his formidable master, Henry VIII, settles to short-lived happiness with his third queen, before Jane dies giving birth to the male heir he most craves. Cromwell is a man with only his wits to rely on; he has no great family to back him, no private army. Despite rebellion at home, traitors plotting abroad and the threat of invasion testing Henry’s regime to breaking point, Cromwell’s robust imagination sees a new country in the mirror of the future. But can a nation, or a person, shed the past like a skin? Do the dead continually unbury themselves? What will you do, the Spanish ambassador asks Cromwell, when the king turns on you, as sooner or later he turns on everyone close to him? With The Mirror and the Light, Hilary Mantel brings to a triumphant close the trilogy she began with Wolf Hall and Bring Up the Bodies. She traces the final years of Thomas Cromwell, the boy from nowhere who climbs to the heights of power, offering a defining portrait of predator and prey, of a ferocious contest between present and past, between royal will and a common man’s vision: of a modern nation making itself through conflict, passion and courage.     ...Show more

Beneath the Fig Leaves by Olympia Panagiotopoulos

$32.99 AUD

Category: Australian Fiction

 In 1955, in a village in Greece that was marred by war and poverty, Giannoula and Fotios Panagiotopoulos dreamed of providing a better life for their children. Australia, it was rumoured, was a land of opportunity where hard work brought reward. Leaving behind family and friends, they set off to m ake a new home on the other side of the world. Half a lifetime later, under the shade of a fig tree and in the dappled Melbourne sunlight, Giannoula regales her youngest daughter, Olympia, with stories of her homeland and journey. An evocative exploration of the ties that bind, Beneath the Fig Leaves weaves an irresistible tapestry of family, food and history to stir the heart and senses.   ...Show more

Boy Swallows Universe by Trent Dalton

$19.99 AUD

Category: Australian Fiction | Reading Level: very good

An utterly wonderful debut novel of love, crime, magic, fate and a boy's coming of age, set in 1980s Australia and infused with the originality, charm, pathos, and heart of Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close and The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time. The mind can take you anywhere you want to go. Eli Bell's life is complicated. His father is lost, his mother is in jail, and his stepdad is a heroin dealer. The most steadfast adult in Eli's life is Slim--a notorious felon and national record-holder for successful prison escapes--who watches over Eli and August, his silent genius of an older brother. Exiled far from the rest of the world in Darra, a seedy suburb populated by Polish and Vietnamese refugees, this twelve-year-old boy with an old soul and an adult mind is just trying to follow his heart, learn what it takes to be a good man, and train for a glamorous career in journalism. Life, however, insists on throwing obstacles in Eli's path--most notably Tytus Broz, Brisbane's legendary drug dealer. But the real trouble lies ahead. Eli is about to fall in love, face off against truly bad guys, and fight to save his mother from a certain doom--all before starting high school. A story of brotherhood, true love, family, and the most unlikely of friendships, Boy Swallows Universe is the tale of an adolescent boy on the cusp of discovering the man he will be. Powerful and kinetic, Trent Dalton's debut is sure to be one of the most heartbreaking, joyous and exhilarating novels you will experience. ...Show more

Coming Home to Self: The Adopted Child Grows Up by Nancy N. Verrier

$35.95 AUD

Category: Fiction

Coming Home to Self is a book about becoming aware. It is written for all members of the adoption triad: adoptees, birth parents, and adoptive parents as well as those who are in relationship with them, including professionals. It explains the influence imprinted upon the nuerological system and, thus, on future functioning. It explains how false beliefs create fear and perpetuate being ruled by the wounded child. It is a book which will help adoptees discover their authentic selves after living without seeing themselves reflected back all their lives. ...Show more

Fair Warning by Michael Connelly

$32.99 AUD

Category: Crime Fiction | Series: Jack Mcevoy Ser.

The hero of The Poet and The Scarecrow is back in the new thriller from #1 New York Times bestselling author Michael Connelly. Jack McEvoy, the journalist who never backs down, tracks a serial killer who has been operating completely under the radar--until now. Veteran reporter Jack McEvoy has taken do wn killers before, but when a woman he had a one-night stand with is murdered in a particularly brutal way, McEvoy realizes he might be facing a criminal mind unlike any he's ever encountered. McEvoy investigates--against the warnings of the police and his own editor--and makes a shocking discovery that connects the crime to other mysterious deaths across the country. But his inquiry hits a snag when he himself becomes a suspect. As he races to clear his name, McEvoy's findings point to a serial killer working under the radar of law enforcement for years, and using personal data shared by the victims themselves to select and hunt his targets. Called "the Raymond Chandler of this generation" (Associated Press), Michael Connelly once again delivers an unputdownable thriller that reveals a predator operating from the darkest corners of human nature--and one man courageous and determined enough to stand in his way. ...Show more

HANDWRITING CONVENTIONS QLD YEAR 3 by STEVE MURRAY ILLUSTRATOR

$13.95 AUD

Category: Fiction

Julian Fellowes's Belgravia (TV Tie-in) by Julian Fellowes

$22.99 AUD

Category: Historical Fiction

Julian Fellowes's Belgravia is the story of a secret. A secret that unravels behind the porticoed doors of London's grandest postcode. Set in the 1840s when the upper echelons of society began to rub shoulders with the emerging industrial nouveau riche, Belgravia is peopled by a rich cast of characters. But the story begins on the eve of the Battle of Waterloo in 1815. At the Duchess of Richmond's now legendary ball, one family's life will change for ever... ...Show more

Normal People by Sally Rooney

$19.99 AUD

Category: International Fiction

A universal story of love, friendship, and growing up. At school Connell and Marianne pretend not to know each other. He's popular and well-adjusted, star of the school football team, while she is lonely, proud, and intensely private. But when Connell comes to pick his mother up from her job at Marianne 's house, a strange and indelible connection grows between the two teenagers-one they are determined to conceal. A year later, they're both studying at Trinity College in Dublin. Marianne has found her feet in a new social world while Connell hangs at the sidelines, shy and uncertain. Throughout their years at university, Marianne and Connell circle one another, straying toward other people and possibilities but always magnetically, irresistibly drawn back together. And as she veers into self-destruction and he begins to search for meaning elsewhere, each must confront how far they are willing to go to save the other. Sally Rooney brings her brilliant psychological acuity and perfectly spare prose to a story that explores the subtleties of class, the electricity of first love, and the complex entanglements of family and friendship. Longlisted for the 2018 Man Booker Prize Winner of Novel of the Year at the An Post Irish Book Awards Winner of the Costa Novel Award " Rooney] has been hailed as the first great millennial novelist for her stories of love and late capitalism... she writes] some of the best dialogue I've read."--The New Yorker ...Show more