An examination of family dynamics through three novels...Adam Haslett’s Mothers and Sons reflects on unspoken stories and familial divides; The Boy from the Sea by Garrett Carr, set in 1970s Ireland, tells the story of a family that takes in a child washed ashore, and Robert Lukins’ Somebody Down There Likes Me depicts an uber-rich family who gather together as their wealth and corruption begin to unravel.

BOOKS

Adam Haslett, Mothers and Sons, Hamish Hamilton

Robert Lukins, Somebody Down There Likes Me, Allen & Unwin

Garrett Carr, The Boy from the Sea, Picador

GUESTS

Claire Mabey, founder of NZ’s Verb Wellington literary organisation and writers’ festival; books editor at The Spinoff; writer whose middle-grade children’s book The Raven's Eye Runaways was published last year. And, here's a link to the NZ book awards Claire mentions: https://www.nzbookawards.nz/new-zealand-book-awards/)

Jonty Claypole, CEO Red Room Poetry; co-host of podcast The Secret Life of Books; author, Words Fail Us: In Defence of Disfluency 

OTHER BOOKS MENTIONEDPercival Everett, JamesCharles Dickens, David CopperfieldBarbara Kingsolver, Demon CopperheadSamantha Harvey, OrbitalRobert Lukins, The Everlasting Sunday; LovelandF. Scott Fitzgerald, The Great GatsbyMark Twain, Moby DickShakespeare, HamletEvelyn Waugh, Brideshead RevisitedAudrey Magee, The ColonyPaul Murray, The Bee StingPaul Lynch, Prophet SongColm Toibin, worksNiall Williams, Time of the ChildFiona McFarlane, The Sun Walks DownJames Baldwin, Giovanni's RoomJane Austen, Pride and PrejudiceMarilynne Robinson, GileadSusannah Clarke, PiranesiDamien Wilkins, DeliriousHarriet Baker, Rural Hours

CREDITS

• Presenter: Kate Evans, Cassie McCullagh
• Producer: Kate Evans, Sarah Corbett
• Sound engineer: John Jacobs, Ann Marie Debettencor
• Executive producer, Rhiannon Brown 

Alaska, folktales and mothers and daughters in Eowyn Ivey's Black Woods Blue Sky. Pulitzer Prize–winning writer Anne Tyler is back with Three Days in June, another novel about mothers and daughters; and Italian novelist Vincenzo Latronico's Perfection, a critique of social media and contemporary life.

BOOKS

Eowyn Ivey, Black Woods, Blue Sky, Tinder Press

Anne Tyler, Three Days in June, Chatto & Windus

Vincenzo Latronico, Perfection (translated from the Italian by Sophie Hughes), Text

GUESTS

Alice Pung, novelist, memoirist and editor. Her books include Unpolished Gem, Laurinda and One Hundred Days

Dylin Hardcastle, novelist, artist and screenwriter, currently completing their PhD. Their novels include Below Deck and A Language of Limbs 

OTHER BOOKS MENTIONEDEowyn Ivey, The Snow ChildJohn Marsden, worksAnne Tyler, worksJazz Money, Mark the DawnDavid Owen Kelly, Host CityKirsty Jagger, RoseghettoWeike Wang, Joan is Okay

CREDITS

• Presenter: Kate Evans, Cassie McCullagh
• Producer: Kate Evans, Sarah Corbett
• Sound engineer: Craig Tilmouth, John Jacobs, Tegan Nicholls
• Executive producer, Rhiannon Brown

A brief foray into the world of ‘romantasy’ and the international bestseller Onyx Storm by Rebecca Yarros. A story of yearning, belonging, secrets and identity from Native America in Morgan Talty’s Fire Exit; rusted robots, prosthetic limbs, AI and noisy families in Nigerian-American writer Nnedi Okorafor’s Death of the Author; and coercive control and walking on eggshells in Irish writer Roisín  O’Donnell’s Nesting.

BOOKS 

Morgan Talty, Fire Exit, Scribe 

Rebecca Yarros, Onyx Storm [Book three in the Fourth Wing/Empyrean series], Piatkus 

Nnedi Okorafor, Death of the Author, Gollancz 

Roisín O’Donnell, Nesting, Scribner 

GUESTS 

Bruce Isaacs, Associate Professor of Film Studies at the University of Sydney; and co-host of the podcast Film Versus Film

Sarah Gilbert, journalist, Executive Producer, Impact Studios, University of Technology, Sydney. Her latest book is Unconventional Women: The Story of the last Blessed Sacrament Sisters in Australia. She is currently writing a biblio-memoir set in Buenos Aires, and has a podcast coming with Sydney Review of Books called Fully Lit

OTHER BOOKS MENTIONED

Nikki May, Wahala

Dostoevsky, Crime and Punishment

Iain Pears, An Instance of the Fingerpost

Umberto Eco, The Name of the Rose

Elizabeth Jane Howard, The Cazalet Chronicles

Elsa Morante, Lies and Sorcery

Elene Ferrante, works

CREDITS

• Presenter, Kate Evans + Cassie McCullagh
• Producer, Kate Evans + Sarah Corbett
• Sound engineer, John Jacobs and Harvey O'Sullivan
• Executive producer, Rhiannon Brown

Cassie and Kate read Marie-Hélène Lafon’s The Son’s Story, a family story that spans the twentieth-century, full of melancholy beauty and secrets. Crime writer Hayley Scrivenor reads Geoff Parkes’ When the Deep Dark Bush Swallows You Whole, a story of small towns, envy and threat in New Zealand; and documentary maker Johan Gabrielsson reads Swedish bestseller The Group, by Sigge Eklund, in which art, sun, wealth and beautiful people meet and mingle in Madrid.

BOOKS

Marie-Hélène Lafon, The Son’s Story (translated from the French by Stephanie Smee), MLP

Geoff Parkes, When the Deep Dark Bush Swallows You Whole, Penguin Random House

Sigge Eklund, The Group (translated from the Swedish by Rachel Willson-Broyles), Ithaka Press

GUESTS

Hayley Scrivenor, crime writer whose books are Dirt Town and – her latest – Girl Falling

Johan Gabrielsson, documentary maker: longtime Australian resident, he was born in Sweden

OTHER BOOKS MENTIONED

Mary McCarthy, The Group

Patricia Highsmith, The Talented Mr Ripley

Ashley Kalagian Blunt, Cold Truth

Sara Foster, When She Was Gone

Samantha Byres, Dead Ends

James Bridle, Ways of Being

Slavoj Zizek, Too Late To Awaken 

CREDITS

• Presenter: Kate Evans, Cassie McCullagh
• Producer: Kate Evans, Sarah Corbett
• Sound engineer, Roi Huberman, Harvey O'Sullivan
• Executive producer, Rhiannon Brown

Kate and Cassie are back for 2025 to discuss Panic by Catherine Jinks, about a young woman looking for a fresh start after posting a drunken rant that went horrifically viral. Novelist George Haddad, and Professor Sue Turnbull, who specialises in crime drama and fiction, are also along, to take a look at new novels by Miles Franklin winner Shankari Chandran and American author Garth Greenwell.

BOOKS

Catherine Jinks, Panic, Text

Garth Greenwell, Small Rain, Picador

Shankari Chandran, Unfinished Business, Ultimo Press

GUESTS

George Haddad, novelist, artist and lecturer in Creative Writing at the University of Western Sydney. His novel Losing Face was published in 2022

Sue Turnbull, Professor of Communication and Media at the University of Wollongong, who specialises in crime drama and fiction. She is also chief crime fiction reviewer for The Age and SMH

OTHER BOOKS MENTIONEDKaliane Bradley, The Ministry of TimeAlice Winn, In MemoriamRichard J. Evans, Hitler's PeopleGeorge Eliot, MiddlemarchCaroline Darian, I'll Never Call Him Dad Again:  Turning our family trauma of Chemical Submission into a collective fightCurtis Sittenfeld, Show Don't Tell; Romantic Comedy; EligibleGarth Greenwell, CleannessShankari Chandran, Chai Time at Cinnamon GardensKatherine Brabon, Body FriendBen Watt, Patient Alexandros Papadiamantis, The MurderessMichelle de Kretser, Theory and PracticeRonni Salt, Gunnawah Ashley Kalagian Blunt, Cold Truth; Dark ModeKatherena Vermette, The Stranger family trilogy

CREDITS

• Presenter: Kate Evans, Cassie McCullagh
• Producer: Kate Evans, Sarah Corbett
• Sound engineer: Tegan Nicholls, Harvey O'Sullivan
• Executive producer: Rhiannon Brown

Reading Percival Everett's James, Dylin Hardcastle's Language of Limbs and James McBride's The Heaven and Earth Grocery Store

Cassie and literary interviewer Michaela Kalowski discussed Percival Everett's James in a conversation first broadcast on 15 March 2024

Kate and Jonathan Green reviewed Dylin Hardcastle's Language of Limbs on 19 July 2024

And James McBride spoke to Kate about The Heaven and Earth Grocery Store for Radio National's 2024 Big Weekend of Books

Books you might have missed: from England, Turkey and within the Australian Tongan community

Cassie and critic Beejay Silcox agree to disagree over David Nicholls' You Are Here – from a conversation first broadcast on 19 April 2024

Kate, Richard Aedy and writer Patrick Carey reviewed Oisín McKenna, Evenings and Weekends on 28 June 2024

Cassie, Beejay Silcox and academic Jioji Ravulo read Winnie Dunn's Dirt Poor Islanders on 19 April 2024

And Cassie spoke to Turkish-British author Elif Shafak ahead of the publication of her novel There Are Rivers in the Sky, on Radio National's 2024 Big Weekend of Books

Time to reassess your TBR pile – To Be Read, that is – ready for 2025. To help, some of the best books and literary discussions from the past year.

Kate and Cassie's review of Rita Bullwinkel's Headshot was first broadcast on 16 August 2024

Kate and Richard Aedy's discussion of Catherine McKinnon's To Sing of War was first broadcast on 28 June 2024

Cassie and Kate first delved into Rodney Hall's Vortex on 22 August 2024

Ready for some Big Books? Ambition, money, philosophy, bodies and history – all explored through history.

Cassie and Tom Wright's review of Andrew O'Hagan's Caledonian Road was first broadcast on 28 March 2024

Kate and Cassie with Polish publicist Anna O'Grady, on Olga Tokarczuk's The Empusium, was first broadcast on 20 September 2024

English writer Francis Spufford spoke to Kate about his novel Cahokia Jazz on Radio National's Big Weekend of Books in June 2024

Catch up on the best books and discussions about them from the last year. A songwriter, a plaintive guitar, time travel and a motel are all in the mix.

Kate and Cassie's review of Willie Vlautin's Horse was originally was originally broadcast on 26 July 2024

Cassie and Jonathan Green's appraisal of Kaliane Bradley's Ministry of Time was originally broadcast on 30 May 2024

Kate, Kate Mildenhall and Beejay Silcox disagreed over Miranda July's All Fours back on 21 June 2024

And bookseller David Gaunt and NZ Festival Director Claire Mabey gave their book recommendations on 26 July 2024