Spectrum
Opinion
Literature
Banning books? I’m all the better for the blood and gore of my education
My high school syllabus was a bloodbath of sex and death in which students were slowly marinated for six long years.
- by Richard Glover
Latest
The Essex Serpent: madness, demons and swooning
Claire Danes and Tom Hiddelston star in this unusual tale set in Victorian-era England
- by Kylie Northover
An intimate and insightful memoir alive with questions
Sian Prior interrogates her intense pull toward motherhood in Childless.
- by Natasha Mitchell
Is there a secret to writing a bestselling book?
No two authors are quite alike and new books by Lee Kofman and The Rosie Project’s Graeme Simsion reveal how different writing advice can be.
- by Jane Sullivan
Eight new books to read this week
Cameron Woodhead and Steven Carroll’s snap reviews of eight new releases.
- by Cameron Woodhead and Steven Carroll
Bringing down the bourgeoisie - with witchcraft
Jane Rawson again melds speculative and historical fiction in her latest book, with fascism meeting witchcraft.
- by Kerryn Goldsworthy
An affecting meditation on mortality
Poet Sarah Holland-Batt’s third book is, in the wake of her father’s death, a deeply felt collection.
- by Geoff Page
Can we predict the future? This eerie experiment might make you think twice
The absorbing and thought-provoking Premonitions Bureau tells the inside story of a scientific research project that sought to prove our powers of premonition.
- by Simon Caterson
‘I could no longer even understand the person I was before’: The trip that changed a novelist’s life
Seven years ago, Claire G. Coleman says, her life was irrevocably changed.
- by Claire G. Coleman
25 years on, Julia Roberts not getting the guy is iconic
My Best Friend’s Wedding, the subversive 1997 hit by Aussie P.J. Hogan, broke the rules of Hollywood romcom lore.
- by Sinead Stubbins
Why’s everyone hopping mad about kangaroo courts?
A Libs back-and-forth over a federal ICAC reignited interest in the term “kangaroo court”. Where does it come from?
- by David Astle