The Memory Stones by Australian journalist Caroline Brothers A novel that takes us into some very dark places and histories, in the recent life of Argentina.

There’s a spelling bee, arts quiz and some festive tunes from the Vinyl Frontier. Guests: actor Daniel Monks, author Maria Lewis, artist Lisa Hilli, author Melanie Cheng, author Nick Earls, theatre director Sam Strong.

Isabel Allende's debut novel The House of the Spirits was published in 1982. It's set in an unnamed Latin American country and it follows three generations of the Trueba family who live in the presence of spirits. It's our final Latin American book club novel for the year.

Today exploring the legacy of feminism with a new exhibition at Melbourne’s Australian Centre for Contemporary Art, a wrap up of the main stage theatre in New York and London with Richard Jordon, and we speak to Paul Lynch about his poetic novel Grace, about the devastation that was the Irish famine of the 1840's. As well, we find out what the favourite books of 2017 were for RN presenters, Robyn Williams and Antony Funnell.

Cactus Channel live in the music studio, writer Rick Gekoski chooses his Masterpiece, novelist Roger McDonald on his latest book A Sea-Chase, artist Paul Ryan.

Melbourne pianist and composer Andrea Keller with her song cycle Still Night, biographer Brenda Niall on her biography of her grandmother and Indonesian artists writer Intan Paramaditha and dancer Eko Supriyanto at the Ubud Writers and Readers Festival.

Join us for the best of this week's Books and Arts.

In this program,the CEO of Grattan Institute John Daley tells us what's on the 2017 list of book recommendations for the Prime Minister to read and why, and we explore the dark side of the stories we've told ourselves over the centuries in All the better to see you with: Fairy tales transformed, a new exhibition at the Ian Potter Museum in Melbourne. We also discover why the Merchant Ivory production of EM Forster's 1908 novel, Room With a View is best selling author Kevin Kwan's Masterpiece, literary critic Sarah Holland-Batt reviews the second offerings of much awarded writers AS Patric and Jane Harper as well as checking out the Top Shelf of poet and novelist Philip Salom.

British author Jenny Uglow speaks about her new biography of the poet and artist Edward Lear, Lubaina Himid has taken out the prestigious Turner Prize for 2017, Melbourne Festival's artistic director Jonathan Holloway's Masterpiece, journalist and writer Luke Slattery reimagines the early days of white settlement in Sydney and find out what's on children's author and illustrator Sally Rippin's Top Shelf.

Ex-serviceman Mark Johnston is pushing for a National Veterans’ Art Museum, Isabel Allende's latest novel In the Midst of Winter, Artist William Gardiner at the Taranthi Festival in SA, and we review the science fiction novel Artemis by Andy Weir