Books
Beware the boom in traffic
KAREN HARDY Every car engine could be an explosive threat in Steve Worland's "buddy show" tale of environmental caution.
Jonathan K. Benton: Books that changed me
Author Jonathan K. Benton talks about his favourite books.
Bookshop
Thuy On On the shelf this week: Holiday in Cambodia, Changing Gears and That is Not a Good Idea!.
Writers drawn to magical realm of picture books
LINDA MORRIS Writing a children's picture book is new territory for Hilary Bell but not out of the comfort zone for this writer for stage, radio, screen and music theatre.
Freeing my father
Writing his epic new family novel was a protracted, deeply personal labour of love for Richard Flanagan.
A paen for lost Labor values
Review By Andrew Riemer The novelist creates a fine but puzzling portrayal of Australia's early politics and national psyche.
Interview: Fiona McFarlane
Marc McEvoy There's a tiger in the house, or possibly something more frightening.
Flights of fantasy and fearlessness
Review By James Bradley Writing half a century ago, the French anthropologist and philosopher Claude Levi-Strauss remarked that birds are "good to think with". Levi-Strauss's point concerned the use of structural categories to comprehend the world, yet still, he hit upon something fundamental. More than any other creature, birds pervade our consciousness, inhabiting our descriptions of each other ("in a flap", "owlish", "chicken"), serving as omen and augury, as mediators of the spirit world and symbols of freedom, longevity, birth, death and rebirth, as messengers of the gods and psychopomps. Some even claim Sumerian cuneiform, one of the oldest forms of that most uniquely human creation, writing, was inspired by the sight of the footprints of birds in the mud of the Euphrates.
Intrigue and menace accompany Plantagenets' bloody rise
Review By Peter Pierce The young lion of Blanche d'Alpuget's vibrant, playful and ably researched novel becomes, by its end, Henry II of England. The original, fabled lion was his grandfather, Henry I, who notoriously died after eating ''a surfeit of lampreys''. Or was poisoned by them: d'Alpuget happily intervenes in the tales that have come down to us of the foundation of the Plantagenet dynasty.
Life's mystery addressed in hunt for evil's familiar face
Review By Sue Turnbull There's an other-worldliness about James Lee Burke's crime fiction that takes you to somewhere unfamiliar and strange. This is partly an effect of the orotund prose combined with the larger-than-life characters and the way they talk. In the case of Light of the World, the 20th crime novel to feature former homicide detective Dave Robicheaux and his offsider, Clete Purcell, it's also an effect of the plot.
Where mutual trust abides
Review By Luke Slattery In the age of online relationships, let's reconsider the ''supreme human bond'' in its many forms from mutual advantage to pure pleasure.
A journey through the mind
She has always been a woman of words - and now the world will know it, Marc McEvoy writes.
City's culture cup overfloweth
Reviewer: SASHA GRISHIN Many have thought of Canberra as an art capital, but now it is official, straight from the horse's mouth.
Fear, in an evil fight
Reviewer: SUE TURBULL There's an other-worldliness about James Lee Burke's crime fiction that takes you to somewhere unfamiliar and strange.
Mutual trust abides
Reviewer: LUKE SLATTERY "The highest and finest of all human relationships is, arguably, friendship," writes A.C Grayling.
Teasing out the triptych
Reviewer: ANDREW RIEMER Much as I admire Roger McDonald's work, I have to confess that I am puzzled by this dissection of the Australian psyche.
Unlikely love in the 'city of books'
Reviewer : COLIN STEELE Some of the best contemporary writing is to be found in genres such as crime and science fiction.
Memories made of musty canvas
Bill Garner I remember the smell of the tent and drowsing off to the murmur of the grown-ups around the campfire as they smoked and drank tea.
The mind stalked by time
Marc McEvoy Fiona McFarlane's first novel blends personal and collective histories in an exploration of ageing.
Turning pages
Beauty of the baroque
Jane Sullivan The baroque style is sometimes defined as a misshapen pearl. I love that definition.
Vietnam: Australia's Ten Year War 1962-1972
Reviewed by Dianne Dempsey There are more than 300 photographs in this finely produced hardback book of the Vietnam War.
Search for meaning amid the darkness
Reviewed by Sue Turnbull There's an other-worldliness about James Lee Burke's crime fiction that takes you somewhere strange.
Cheering take on alien visitation
Reviewed by Helen Elliot Matt Haig has a deft capacity for evading sentimentality while cutting through to a sparkling tenderness.
Litbits
First five titles from Finlay Lloyd
Ron Cerabona Finlay Lloyd is bringing out the first titles of a series in which Australian authors had 60 pages to create a book.
Talk about a revolution
Reviewer: VERONICA SEN Parinoush Saniee's The Book of Fate is presented in a sensitively nuanced and lively English translation.
Cold comfort in the ranks
Reviewer: BRUCE HAIGH Sheila Fitzpatrick comes from the intellectual position of wanting to find out what makes the Soviet Union tick.
Tina Brown: The sun sets on a golden career
William Langley looks back over the life and work of one-time editor par excellence Tina Brown.
Critics come to praise this writer
NICK MILLER Hannah Kent always knew she was going to be a writer. But she didn't imagine it like this.
Wit, wisdom and a few poison pens
Damien Murphy Previously unpublished letters to the Herald have been rescued from the darkness to delight and inform.
Comment
Say goodbye to Australian authors' Booker chances
Susan Wyndham With American writers set to dominate, Australian authors can say goodbye to their chances of scooping the prestigious literary prize.
Roman Polanski's teen victim speaks out, 36 years after sex assault
NICK GALVIN The woman sexually assaulted by Roman Polanski when she was just 13 has described how the filmmaker plied her with champagne and drugs before having sex with her.
Man Booker Prize expands to include the United States
Britain's Man Booker Prize says it is expanding to cover all novels written in the English language, saying it will welcome authors whether they come from "Chicago, Sheffield or Shanghai".
Author's dark turn leads to a best-seller
NICK GALVIN Liane Moriarty was sitting in a north shore cafe when she first heard her novel had raced to the top of The New York Times best-seller list.
Liane Moriarty storms bestseller lists with Husband's Secret
NICK GALVIN Liane Moriarty was sitting in a suburban cafe with her toddler when she got the news every author wants to hear.
Ricky Martin only the latest star to write for children
NICK GALVIN Singer, actor and The Voice mentor Ricky Martin is jumping on the celebrity kids' author bandwagon with a book to be released next month.
Poetry plagiarism scandal plays out
NATALIE BOCHENSKI A Brisbane poet should apologise for serial plagiarism, according to a pair of literary Sherlocks.
Sunday Author
Battle Los Angeles
KAREN HARDY A frustrated environmentalist's quest leads to chaos, Karen Hardy writes.
Digging up dirt on the Roses
KAREN HARDY Another intriguing royal figure gets the Philippa Gregory treatment.
Nicole Alexander: books that changed me
Author, grazier and all-round business woman Nicole Alexander talks about her favourite books.
An arch atheist reveals his poetic soul
Jane Wheatley Polarising academic Richard Dawkins still has time for whimsy.
Rating gauges the raunch in romance novels
LINDA MORRIS The explicitness of trysts in romance novels is prompting mainstream publishers to introduce ''heat'' ratings to forewarn - or entice - readers.
Hot between the covers as publishers embrace raunch ratings
LINDA MORRIS The explicitness of trysts in romance novels prompts publishers to introduce 'heat' ratings.
Interview: Eleanor Catton
Marc McEvoy The New Zealander immersed herself in untapped local history, astrological theory and classical fiction to craft her Booker-shortlisted novel.
Short spells conjure animal magic
Review By Alan Attwood Just as Graham Greene used to draw a distinction between novels and books he presented as ''an entertainment'', Robert Drewe is somewhat dismissive of his pen sketches from northern NSW - filed rather like newspaper reports from a correspondent in an especially exotic region of Australia.
Sunset falls on Mittel Europe
Review By Andrew Riemer The Austro-Hungarian ruling dynasty was both powerful and absurd for 300 years before World War I consigned it to oblivion.
West side stories
Phillipa Hawker A who's who of Australian creatives took up the challenge of a daring cinematic experiment.
Fine future for steampunker
Reviewer: JULIETTE HUGHES The book includes a glossary for the terms that can't be Googled.
The search for answers
Reviewer: JEFF POPPLE London detectives David Brock and Kathy Kolla are back on the beat.
Habsburgs with the lot
Reviewer: ANDREW RIEMER Preserving the Habsburg blood-lines resulted in a disturbing number of cretins and half-wits.
Video
King's Speech book unveiled
Grandson of Lionel Logue, King George VI's speech therapist, releases book of treasures which fills in the movie gaps.
'Borat' to play Iraqi dictator
Sacha Baron Cohen will portray an Iraqi dictator in a film based on a book believed to have been penned by Saddam Hussein.
Joe Jackson promotes conspiracy book
Joe Jackson hopes to uncover the conspiracy behind his son's death, helping promote a new book 'What Really Happened to Michael Jackson'.
Palin wins Gawker injunction
US federal judge orders Gawker Media to pull leaked pages of Sarah Palin's forthcoming book from its blog.
Former President Bush book tour
Former President George W. Bush has kicked off his book tour with a signing of his book, "Decision Points".
The evolution of the bogan
A new book argues that bogans have transformed into celebrity-mimicking racists.
President Obama pens children's book
A children's book authored by US President Barack Obama hit bookstores across the US on Tuesday.
Magazine under fire for plagiarism
Recipe author Monica Gaudio explains how she first learnt about the US cooking magazine Cooks Source's act of plagiarism.
Keith Richards launches autobiography
Keith Richards signs copies at London book launch.
