Book Club

When Leonie Wallace set out to write a book about unsolved murders in Portland, she thought she would be writing a kind of murder mystery, a whodunnit. But as she researched what happened that day 20 years ago, she realised that what she was writing about was the people whose lives were changed th..

After a solid season, with plenty of runs on the board and more than his fair share of time at the writing crease, Gideon Haigh is looking forward to the off-season. When autumn heralds the end of cricket, he is able to turn his busy mind to other topics. First up, he’ll be out and about t..

The Indie Awards were set up by Independent Booksellers, to recognise the books they most enjoyed selling during the year. It’s a nice idea that puts the personal back into bookselling, working against the mass-market mentality that turns books into “product”. This year’..

Friends of Bendigo Library will hold their annual general meeting this week. City of Greater Bendigo Organisation Support director Marg Allan will be guest speaker, to talk about the plans for Bendigo Library’s redevelopment. The library is gearing up for a temporary move, while the building..

Currawalli Street Christopher Morgan Allen and Unwin, $27.99 Christopher Morgan is a relatively new author, who turned to writing by happenstance. Diagnosed with a brain tumour in 1996, he says the “only thing improved by the tumour was my imagination”. He wrote The Is..

When Henk Kraima (pictured) set up an organisation in 1986, to do something about the alarming drop in booksales and reading in the Netherlands, he was asked in interviews, “So, how do you intend to go about it?”. “I had no idea,” he told an audience in Bendigo this week. ..

When Lisa D’Onofrio rolled up her sleeves and threw herself into organising a Children’s Literature Festival in Castlemaine, she hoped for a decent turn-up. It had taken all her persuasive powers, a bucket-load of patience, truck-loads of time and an enormous pile of energy to make it ..

Huntly author Katrina Nannestad thinks of herself as a “closet writer”, not much given to chatting while she’s actually in the process of story-making. Talking to the children who read her books, however, is something she loves to do. “I’m really private when I&rsqu..

On February 7, 200 years ago, Charles John Huffam Dickens was born. To celebrate this event, Bendigo Library (5.30pm, phone 5449 2781) is hosting a kind of Little Dickens; dramatised readings from a half-dozen of the novels by Castlemaine actors Bev Geldard and Michael Treloar. Bev say..

This is one of those books you have to go back to the beginning to read, once you’ve finished it. The first short chapter is very weird, so it’s important not to let it put you off. But once you’re in to this rather black comedy, it’s both enjoyable and thought-provoki..

Jennifer Egan A Visit from the Goon Squad Constable and Robinson, $19.99 THE way writers such as Jennifer Egan go about their novels may just be a reason that the paper book will not be entirely replaced by the ebook. While you can whip through Egan’s fast, funny, bol..

Keeper Of The Light Diane Chamberlain Harlequin, $29.99 Don’t be fooled that this is your average love story. Dr Olivia Simon is a dedicated doctor with experience in a large and busy hospital. She has been persuaded to come to a smaller town by her husband, Pau..

The Seamstress Maria Duenas Picador, $32.99 If you’re a reader who likes a touch of history with your fiction, this epic novel, set in Madrid, Morocco and Lisbon will be right up your alley. It’s 1935 in Madrid when we first meet Sira Quiroga, a young seamstress raised by her si..

Troubling as the arrival of ebooks is for books and publishing, there has never been a better time for reading. Where once people who live in the country had only a fraction of the access city people have to both new publications and old, now, we are linked in to libraries, bookshops and publisher..

We asked Bendigo Weekly bookclubbers to send us the titles of books they have enjoyed this year. Most are new, some are classics... Ape House by Sara Gruen: the follow-up to Water for Elephants, about a scientist at the Great Ape Language Lab The Art of Fielding by Chad Har..

BENDIGO poet Tru Dowling says it feels a little strange finally to see her poems gathered in a classy chapbook, her name on the cover, the poems sitting firm and final on the white page. But it was always going to happen. “I feel like I can’t not write poetry,” Tru says. &ldquo..

Memoirs Of A Consenting Victim by Tru Dowling This is the time she aches for breaks given rules for bidden for the time it tick tick tick tick ticks ticks ticked him off the list the gist was to recognize realign the white lies, blow flies of his owl brown e..

Where do you go after Harry Potter? Daniel Radcliffe showed he is serious about developing his career as an actor by playing in a small-budget film made in Australia and based on the novel by Michael Noonan. Now, apparently, at 22 Radcliffe is preparing to take on a role that is as different fro..

IS there anybody out there? A couple of weeks back a newcomer to Bendigo contacted us at the Weekly because she has heard about our Bookclub. She had moved from another Australian city, where she had been a member of a different kind of bookclub, the reading group kind which meets regularly at a..

Ship Kings Andrew McGahan Allen and Unwin, $22.99 A SEA shanty with a mythical whirlpool at its heart. Miles Franklin-award winning author, Andrew McGahan, has continued on his merry way, working through every genre known to readers, by embarking on a four-book fantasy series. The Coming ..