Looking for something to read? Here are 10 new books
FICTION PICK OF THE WEEK
This Is Not a Game
Kelly Mullen
Century, $34.99
You already know a book called This Is Not a Game will totally be a game, right? If you're not sleuth enough to work that out, sight unseen, Kelly Mullen's clever murder mystery might not be for you. It's a blackly funny take on the locked-room subgenre – the locked room in this case being a palatial abode on an island on Lake Huron (complete with drawbridge and moat), the guests trapped there in the middle of an epic snowstorm. Lusty, super-rich widow Jane Ireland has invited a diverse company for a charity auction, and she's stabbed to death before the night is out. Two of the guests – crotchety grandmother Mimi, and her granddaughter Addie – transform into an unlikely detective duo, unravelling a sordid web of taboo sex, intrigue and blackmail, sifting through an overabundance of suspects as clues and corpses mount. Mullen has created a ludic play on classic Agatha Christie-style crime fiction, more fun for being gossipy and backbiting and full of witty one-liners.
The Bearcat delves into the formative years of notorious cult leader Anne Hamilton-Byrne, who led the Family, a cabal that followed a hodge-podge of Eastern religion and Christianity and believed Anne's claim to be the reincarnation of Jesus. Nonfiction accounts and documentaries have laid bare lurid details of child abuse – Anne illegally adopted children through the 1960s and '70s, dyed their hair peroxide blonde like hers and some were administered LSD as part of their indoctrination. Georgia Rose Phillips focuses on Anne – born Evelyn – as a girl and young woman, her own childhood in the 1920s and the traumatic experiences that drew her to harm others later in life. Phillips does have a gift for striking phrases and imagery, but there are gaps and inconsistencies in this reimagining that jar with what we know of the history. As a result, The Bearcat isn't entirely persuasive either as historical fiction or as a psychological portrait, though its subject is a fascinating and deeply disturbing figure.
Everything Lost, Everything Found
Matthew Hooton
4th Estate, $34.99
Memory rises and ebbs in this poignant novel spanning almost a century. Everything Lost, Everything Found follows Jack through an unusual childhood and seven decades later in old age. As a youth, he's drawn into the Brazilian Amazon during the rubber boom, following his parents to Henry Ford's rubber-tree plantation, where his mother dies in a tragic accident and Jack is forced to find his father in the jungle. Recollections of that time resurface unbidden when he's elderly and living in the rust belt in Michigan, Jack swimming in a surfeit of memories as his wife succumbs to dementia. Hooton's novel is an emotive and richly told tale of grief and loss, of family and the haunted halls of memory. I've spent time in the Brazilian Amazon myself, and the evocation of its wild beauty and perils, and the dark industrial history now half-swallowed by nature, is vivid and accurate, adding an exotic layer to this free-flowing and immersive book.
The Nights Are Quiet in Tehran
Shida Bazyar (trans. Ruth Martin)
Scribe, $29.99
Set over four decades – with sections in 1979, the year of the Iranian Revolution, and every 10 years until the Green Movement protests in 2009 – this novel portrays an Iranian family forced to leave their homeland, capturing a spirit of political resistance as much as the struggle to adapt to life as refugees. It begins with Behsad, an idealistic young communist revolutionary who wants the Shah deposed as much as anyone. He fights for his beliefs and falls in love with the intelligent, equally brave Nahid. Ten years later, Nahid takes up the story from West Germany, having fled when the mullahs seized power. A return to Tehran in 1999 focuses on Nahid's daughter Laleh, her reconnection with a birthplace she misremembers and a family history full of secrets, and finally, there's Laleh's brother, Mo, energised by witnessing the wave of Iranian protests a decade later. Shida Bazyar captures the contradictions of her characters and their predicament with clarity and poise, giving complex and emotionally layered perspectives on exile and return.
A Shipwreck in Fiji
Nilima Rao
Echo, $32.99
A Shipwreck in Fiji is the second in Nilima Rao's series of historical mystery novels set in Fiji in the early 20th century. It follows Sergeant Akal Singh, an unwilling Indian transplant, on his latest adventure. He's been dragooned into investigating reports of Germans – a very long way from the battlefields of World War I – on the island of Ovalau, accompanied by Constable Taviti Tukana, who'll be visiting his uncle, a powerful tribal chief. They're to act as chaperone to two venturesome European sightseers, Mary and Katherine, while checking in on Ovalau's only cop – a teenage recruit with a dramatic temperament. Nothing goes according to plan, and Akal is soon drawn into the apparent murder of a deeply unpopular merchant, and the problem of a group of European sailors held captive by Taviti's uncle. Amid all that clamour, one of the ladies accompanying them has her own agenda to pursue. Rao's novel is a retro delight, with an endearing detective (and sidekick) navigating a web of cultures and trying to resolve island trouble.
Fearless Beatrice Faust: Sex, Feminism & Body Politics
Judith Brett
Text, $36.99
She was a motherless child with a 'visceral hunger for love' who grew up to be a political advocate for the body's appetites and pleasures. A woman dogged by physical ailments who struggled with feelings of worthlessness while projecting a public persona of sexual assurance and intellectual independence. As a 'sceptical feminist' who enjoyed feminine glamour, she found herself at odds with the women's liberation movement even as she campaigned for abortion rights and founded the Women's Electoral Lobby in 1972. This nuanced and, at times, poignant biography of Beatrice Faust captures its subject in all her contradictions, illuminating how some of Faust's more perplexing views – on pornography and paedophilia in particular – were shaped by childhood experiences and her supreme sexual confidence. 'She had no trouble saying no, and she didn't always see why other women might.' While clear-sighted about Faust's blind spots and idiosyncrasies, Judith Brett pays tender tribute to the bravery of 'this frail, super-smart woman'.
Trouwerner: A Tasmanian Elder's Story of Ancient Wisdom and Hope
Aunty Patsy Cameron & Martin Flanagan
Magabala Books, $34.99
'Walking through the bush with Patsy is like entering a crowded room when you're a stranger and your companion seems to know everyone.' This classically Flanaganesque observation distils perfectly the spirit of this singular book. Journalist and author Martin Flanagan, a Tasmanian of convict Irish descent, grew up on the myth that Tasmanian Aboriginal people were extinct. In a searching tale that wends its way through the rugged landscape of Tasmania's past, Indigenous elder and historian Patsy Cameron is his guide. Woven into their conversation is previous Tasmanian governor Kate Warner and the story of her journey into a fuller understanding of Tasmania's Indigenous heritage. At the centre of this quest is the story of Mannalargenna, the warrior leader of Cameron's clan, and his fraught negotiations with George Robinson, the preacher whose mission forced Aboriginal Tasmanians into exile. After contemplating a portrait of Mannalargenna, Flanagan asks, 'He knows who he is. Who are we?'
The Shortest History of AI
Toby Walsh
Black Inc, $27.99
If your brain tends to seize up with fear or incomprehension at the mention of AI, this concise and entertaining history is for you. Right from the playful opening lines, 'Artificial Intelligence began on 18 June 1956. It was a Monday' you know you are in the hands of an assured storyteller. Toby Walsh, an Australian professor of AI and world-leading researcher, is also a sci-fi nerd who's not afraid to judiciously insert himself into the narrative to add personal commentary and underscore just how recent this history is. He acknowledges Alan Turing as the father of modern computing and AI but also pays due to the 19th-century mathematical whizz Ada Lovelace, who was the world's first computer programmer. This history is delivered through the six key ideas that encapsulate how AI has evolved and where it might be heading. The thinking behind these ideas is made accessible through easy-to-follow examples and some amusing 'conversations' with ChatGPT that highlight both its astonishing range and its capacity for bullshit.
For Socrates, the unexamined life was not worth living. Freud insisted that we will always be strangers to ourselves. We are, says historian Mark Lilla, in a constant state of hide and seek, torn between the desire to know and the fear of what we might find. Religious injunctions against rule-breaking and curiosity – Adam and Eve's expulsion from the Garden of Eden, for example – enact this inner conflict. 'Like all successful bureaucrats, we have learnt to kick the hard problem upstairs,' says Lilla, whose punchy way with words is integral to the pleasure of this work. While he describes his narrative as a ramble rather than a journey with a fixed destination, he has clear polemical targets, as evident in his caricature of mysticism. Even so, his overall contention that 'the harder the truth, the greater the temptation to escape it' rings powerfully true. By exposing the machinery of this inner tug-of-war, Lilla challenges us to confront these impulses in ourselves.
Diet, Drugs, and Dopamine: The New Science of Achieving a Healthy Weight
David A. Kessler
Text, $36.99
David Kessler has struggled with his weight all his life and is now benefiting from the new anti-obesity drugs. But as a medical practitioner and former US Food and Drug Administration commissioner, he is at pains to stress that these medications are not a silver bullet. They come with side effects, are helpful for only as long as they are being used and do not address underlying causes. Obesity and its attendant health issues, Kessler says, are on the rise because of highly processed foods that have 'quietly commandeered the reward centres of our brains' and encouraged a form of addiction. In this thorough and educative work, he sets out why it is vital for those in the grip of this addiction to employ a range of methods such as a balanced diet, behavioural therapies and physical activity, as well as weight-loss drugs. He also addresses the potentially harmful messaging of the body-positivity movement, which questions the health benefits of weight reduction. Diet, Drugs, and Dopamine is a sensible and sober guide to lasting change.
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WARNING: This article discusses self-harm and suicide and contains distressing content and the name of an Aboriginal person who has died. Everything must be done to ensure another child doesn't die in youth detention, a coroner has told an inquest for an Indigenous teenager who fatally self-harmed while in custody. Yamatji boy Cleveland Dodd, 16, was found unresponsive inside a cell in Unit 18, a youth wing of the high-security adult facility Casuarina Prison in Perth, in the early hours of October 12, 2023. Cleveland was taken to hospital in a critical condition and died a week later, causing outrage and grief in the community. It led to a long-running inquest that started in April 2024, with coroner Philip Urquhart saying he might recommend for Unit 18 to be closed, as he delivered his preliminary findings on Tuesday. "There can be no doubt the evidence from the inquest revealed that youth justice had been a crisis at the time of Cleveland's death and had been for some time," he told the coroner's court. The coroner indicated he might recommend the justice department no longer oversee the youth justice estate. He is considering calling for a special inquiry under the Public Sector Management Act into how Unit 18 came to be established in mid-2022. "Everything must be done to minimise the risk of another death of a child in youth detention," Mr Urquhart said. The coroner said evidence supported findings the justice department had failed to properly supervise Cleveland before he fatally harmed himself. He found staff failed to wear radios as per department policy, Cleveland was confined to his cell for excessive amounts of time and the teen's cell was in a condition that enabled him to self-harm. The department had accepted many failings, including staff not following policies and procedures and Cleveland's lack of access to running water in his cell, Mr Urquhart said. He pointed to extensive evidence Cleveland was not receiving adequate mental health and therapeutic support, education, recreation and "access to fresh air". "There is much evidence to suggest that these needs of Cleveland were not adequately met," he said. Staff described the "appalling conditions in which the young people were being detained" and the "chaotic operating environment" at Unit 18, with some saying it was a "war zone", Mr Urquhart said as he recapped some of the evidence. "They described the soul-destroying daily confinement orders which kept detainees in their cells, sometimes for 24 hours a day," he said. "They described the lack of support and training given to them to do their jobs and they described the chronic shortage of staff." The coroner revisited evidence heard about the establishment of Unit 18, as he made a case for a special inquiry after the department and some other counsel made submissions it was beyond the jurisdiction of the court. He said further adverse findings against the department and individuals would be confined to actions taken or not taken in Unit 18 and matters connected to Cleveland's death. He said examples of these would be what staff did after Cleveland covered his in-cell observation camera and the damage in his unit that enabled him to harm himself. The inquest previously heard Cleveland self-harmed about 1.35am. At 1.51am, an officer opened his cell door and at 1.54am a red alert was issued as staff tried to revive the teen. Paramedics arrived at 2.06am but did not get access to Cleveland, who was found to be in cardiac arrest, for nine minutes. The teen was partially revived and taken to hospital but suffered a brain injury becauise of a lack of oxygen. Cleveland died, surrounded by his family, on October 19, 2023. Lifeline 13 11 14
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Eileen Bond, ex-wife of controversial Perth businessman Alan Bond, dies aged 87
Eileen Bond, the former wife of controversial West Australian businessman Alan Bond, has died. Ms Bond's family has confirmed to the ABC the 87-year-old died on Wednesday night. Alan and Eileen Bond married in 1955 when they were both 17 and had four children together before divorcing in 1992. The Perth-based pair became a high-profile couple as Mr Bond's fortunes grew. They were together when his sailing team won the America's Cup in 1983, prompting massive national celebrations. But Alan Bond left a mixed legacy, with a very public corporate fall that ended with bankruptcy and a jail term. He died in 2015 after undergoing heart surgery. At the time Ms Bond, who had remained on good terms with her former husband, returned to Perth from London. "We've been in constant contact, but it's a very sad time," she told reporters at the time. John Bond, Eileen's son with Alan, also said at the time his parents had remained close to his mother after their divorce and described the pair as "great soul mates who never broke their connection".
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The irrepressible and incomparable Eileen 'Red' Bond has died. The former wife of West Australian entrepreneur Alan Bond, one of the nation's most loved socialites, is said to have passed away after suffering a stroke, her second, in a short period. Bond had been living between homes in Perth and Sydney at the time but died in Perth on Wednesday night. Her age was a national secret but press cuttings suggest she was 85 or 86. Dubbed 'Red' for her famous flame hair, Bond was born Eileen Teresa Hughes in Fremantle, WA, the daughter of a wealthy Irish Catholic family who were the pillars of the church in Fremantle. Her father William was a Perth wool buyer who played football for South Fremantle and became Commissioner of the Fremantle Port Authority. As a teenager she would be swept off her feet by a smitten Alan Bond who she met at a dancing class in 1954 at age 16. By 17 she was pregnant and married. Bond would convert from Church of England to Catholicism for the ceremony. 'My family insisted, but Alan didn't mind, he was very happy to convert …' she would say years later. She and Bond would welcome four children during their marriage: John, Craig, Susanne and Jody. Outside of her family – and her Catholic faith – the famously high-spirited 'Red' loved to travel, party and decorate houses. She once said she could never did anything in moderation. Socialites and social scribes from the nation's west to east coasts loved her for it. 'You have to have either self control or moderation and I certainly haven't the latter,' she once said. 'I can never do anything in moderation. I'll eat and eat then suddenly stop and have next to nothing for eight days in a row.' It was a trait she shared with her husband, a sign-writer who would go on to prosper in property development, later founding the company Bond Corp which also had interests in brewing (Toohey's), and media (Nine), before his name would be writ large in Australian corporate criminal history after he went bankrupt in 1992 with debts totalling $1.8 billion. He was later sentenced to jail for seven years. In the decades prior, Bond had become one of the nation's most famous businessmen whose backing of Australia II to victory in the 1983 America's Cup made him a household name. Through it all his faithful wife had been at his side. She was devastated when the couple's marriage ended as rumours circulated that her much-travelled husband was having an affair with the woman who would become his second wife, Diana Bliss.
