The Readings Podcast

By Readings Books

What's The Readings Podcast about?

The Readings Podcast is a celebration of books, reading and culture. Episodes are published weekly and include author interviews, event recordings, booksellers chatting about their favourite reads, industry insights, and more.

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The Readings Podcast episodes:

04.18.2024
The Comics Question: Notable Books of 2023 Part Two
An instalment of The Comics Question, a series where Bernard Caleo and I discuss comics, graphic novels, and all manner of illustrated books, zines, and other associated productions. In this episode, Bernard Caleo was joined by Readings bookseller Nick Curnow...
04.10.2024
Marina Kamenev in conversation
In this episode, a conversation with journalist and author Marina Kamenev, author of Kin: Family in the 21st Century. While the nuclear family still exists, many more types of kinship surround us. Kin is an investigation into what influences us to...
04.04.2024
Samantha Harvey in conversation
In this episode, a conversation with Samantha Harvey, author of Orbital. This is life on our planet as you’ve never seen it before: in this spellbinding and uplifting novel six astronauts rotate in the International Space Station. They are there...
03.17.2024
Mykaela Saunders in conversation
In this episode, a conversation with Mykaela Saunders, author of a new collection of short stories, ‘Always Will Be’. Saunders is a Koori/Goori and Lebanese writer, teacher and researcher, and the editor of This All Come Back Now, the Aurealis...
03.13.2024
The Comics Question: Notable Books of 2023 Part One with Bernard Caleo
An instalment of The Comics Question, a series where Bernard Caleo and I discuss comics, graphic novels, and all manner of illustrated books, zines, and other associated productions. In this episode, Bernard Caleo was joined by Readings bookseller Nick Curnow...
03.07.2024
Sonny Jane Wise in conversation
In this episode, a conversation with Sonny Jane Wise, a trans, multiply neurodivergent & disabled public speaker, advocate and author. Wise’s most recent book, We’re All Neurodiverse, is an affirming and thoughtful guide to how and why we need to...
02.29.2024
Fiona Sweet, new Executive Director and CEO of Stella, in conversation
In this episode, a conversation with the new Executive Director and CEO of Stella, Fiona Sweet. Stella is a major voice for gender equality and cultural change in Australian literature. Founded in 2012, the organisation’s flagship program is the annual...
02.23.2024
Jeanine Leane in conversation
In this episode, a conversation with Jeanine Leane, Wiradjuri poet, writer and academic. Author of the acclaimed novel Purple Threads, winner of the David Unaipon Award, Leane’s poetry has also been widely awarded and commended across an extensive career as...
02.08.2024
Alex Miller in conversation
In this episode, a conversation with Alex and Stephanie Miller, discussing Miller’s most recent book, A Kind of Confession. The book is a secret look into Alex Miller's writing life, spanning sixty years of creativity and inspiration. As a young...
02.01.2024
Damien Linnane in conversation
In this episode, a conversation with Damien Linnane: writer, artist, and editor of Paper Chained, an art and writing magazine for prisoners. Linnane’s memoir Raw chronicles a childhood marred by physical and sexual abuse, and a man’s subsequent search for identity...
01.24.2024
Helen Hayward in conversation
In this episode, a conversation with Helen Hayward, academic, writer, and author of Home Work. When Helen Hayward had her two children in London, 25 years ago, she found looking after them easy. Loving and looking after her kids was...
01.18.2024
Sam Sempill in conversation
In this episode, a conversation with Sam Sempill, chef, architect, and now author of Eat Lao: Recipes from a Lao Kitchen. The recipes in this book follow the trail of Sam's grandmother's cooking back to Lao. The food her grandmother...
01.11.2024
Raymond Gaita in conversation
In this episode, a conversation recorded at the launch of Raimond Gaita’s Justice and Hope: Essays, Lectures and Other Writings. For more than three decades the incomparable voice of Raimond Gaita has been summoning us to new conversations that deepen...
01.04.2024
Robyn Annear in conversation
In this episode, a conversation with Melbourne's favourite historian, Robyn Annear. In Corners of Melbourne, Annear takes us on an unorthodox tour of the city's streets and corners, telling stories about the events and people that have made these the...
12.18.2023
Ron Rash in conversation
In this episode, a conversation with Ron Rash, author of The Caretaker. It is 1951; the close-knit community of Blowing Rock, North Carolina, does not welcome those who are different. Jacob Hampton’s wealthy parents disinherited him when he married Naomi,...
12.18.2023
Sara M Saleh in conversation
In this episode, a conversation with Sara M Saleh, author of the new poetry collection, The Flirtation of Girls/Ghazal el-Banat. Saleh is not only a poet; she is a human rights lawyer, and is the author of a novel, Songs...
12.08.2023
The Comics Question with Steve Mushin
In this episode, another instalment of The Comics Question, with Bernard Caleo. Bernard spoke with Steve Mushin, an industrial designer, illustrator and inventor, and, writer and illustrator of Ultrawild: an illustrated science and design book about tackling climate change with...
12.01.2023
Ellie And Sam Studd in conversation
In this episode, a conversation with cheese experts Ellie and Sam Studd, authors of The Best Things In Life Are Cheese. In this new book, they share their wealth of knowledge and all the practical info you need to up...
11.24.2023
Charlie Porter in conversation
In this episode, a conversation with Charlie Porter, author of Bring No Clothes: Bloomsbury and the Philosophy of Fashion. In this book, Porter brings us face to face with six members of the Bloomsbury Group, a collective of artists and...
11.17.2023
Mistress Jane in conversation
In this episode, The Dominatrix Next Door: when a cash-strapped single mother of two in suburban Melbourne has a fun idea to start a side hustle running workshops for hens' parties, she has no idea it will lead her on...
11.02.2023
The Comics Question with Sarah Firth
In this episode of The Comics Question, Bernard Caleo interviews Sarah Firth on the topic of Eventually Everything Connects. Eventually Everything Connects is Firth's debut graphic novel, a collection of interconnected visual essays created over eight years. Firth invites you...
10.27.2023
Zadie Smith in conversation
In this episode, hear an online conversation between Zadie Smith and Esther Anatolitis (editor of Meanjin). Smith’s new book The Fraud is a dazzling novel about truth and fiction, Jamaica and Britain, fraudulence and authenticity, and the mystery of 'other people.’...
10.20.2023
Mark Edele in conversation
In this episode, a conversation with academics and writers Mark Edele and Marko Pavlyshyn. Russia's full-scale invasion of Ukraine came as a shock to most of the world. In order to understand why this happened, a growing army of self-declared...
10.08.2023
Joel Deane in conversation
In this episode, a conversation with author, speechwriter and poet Joel Deane, on his eagerly-awaited new novel, Judas Boys. Deane’s protagonist (of sorts) Pinnock is, as the title suggests, a Judas Boy – a private schoolboy gone to seed. He's...
10.06.2023
David McAllister in conversation
In today’s episode, a conversation with David McAllister, author of Ballet Confidential. Ballet Confidential takes us backstage, in a manner of speaking, and serves as a wonderfully elucidatory introduction to the world of ballet. McAllister’s enthusiasm paired with experience, mastery...
09.28.2023
David Meagher in conversation
Please note, this episode contains discussion of child sexual abuse. In this episode, hear David Meagher, author of Secrets and Lies, in conversation. Secrets and Lies is a story about child sexual abuse; the culture that enabled it; how the perpetrator...
09.22.2023
Siân Hughes in conversation
In this episode, a conversation with poet and author Siân Hughes, whose book Pearl is longlisted for this year’s Booker Prize. Pearl is a stunning novel, originally published in the United Kingdom by The Indigo Press, and has just been...
09.15.2023
Tracey Kirkland and Gavin Fang in conversation
In this episode, a conversation with journalists, Tracey Kirkland and Gavin Fang, editors of the essay collection, Pandemedia: How Covid Changed Journalism. The Covid-19 pandemic ripped through the world with no regard for borders, age, status or wealth. It was...
09.08.2023
Eugen Bacon in onversation
In this episode, a recording taken from the launch for Eugen Bacon’s most recent novel, Serengotti. This is a novel bathed in sensuous, original language, a love letter to the strong women who bind families together despite everything. It’s also...
08.31.2023
Kate Grenville in conversation
In this episode, author Kate Grenville talks about her latest book, Restless Dolly Maunder. This novel brings Kate’s grandmother to life as someone we can recognise and whose struggles we can empathise with. This compelling new novel is the story...
08.29.2023
A conversation about The Victorian Pride Centre
In this episode, The Victorian Pride Centre on Fitzroy Street, St Kilda, in Melbourne’s south, was opened on 11 July 2021. Its location, its design and its well-thought out objectives combine to make it one of the most imaginative and...
08.22.2023
Polly Barton in conversation
In this episode, an interview with Polly Barton, writer and translator. Barton is the author of two books of nonfiction, Fifty Sounds from 2021, and Porn: An Oral History, published this year. Barton has also translated numerous works of fiction...
08.18.2023
The Comics Question with Michael Fikaris
This episode is the fourth instalment of The Comics Question series. In these podcasts, Bernard Caleo and Nico Callaghan discuss comics, graphic novels, and the place they inhabit within the broader books and publishing world. For this episode, Bernard and...
08.11.2023
Robert Skinner in conversation
In today’s episode, from one of Australia’s most wryly funny writers comes an original and utterly hilarious memoir of reaching for the stars while lying in a ditch. Robert Skinner arrives in Melbourne, searching for a richer life. Things begin...
08.04.2023
Angela O'Keeffe in conversation
In this episode, a discussion with author Angela O’Keeffe about her new novel, The Sitter. Paris, 2020. A writer is confined to her hotel room during the early days of the pandemic, struggling to finish a novel about Hortense Cezanne,...
07.28.2023
Om Dhuengel in conversation
In this episode, hear Om Dhungel and James Button in conversation with Elly Varrenti, to celebrate the publication of Om’s memoir, Bhutan to Blacktown. This book tells Om Dhungel’s remarkable story — his journey from a remote village to a...
07.21.2023
Antony Loewenstein in conversation
In this episode, a recording taken from bestselling journalist Antony Loewenstein discussing his latest book, The Palestine Laboratory. This book demonstrates in depth how Israel has become a leader in developing spying technology and defence hardware that fuels some of...
07.14.2023
Bruce Wolpe in conversation
In this episode, Bruce Wolpe in conversation with Sean Kelly to discuss Wolpe's new book, Trump's Australia. In the book, leading expert and US and Australian politics insider Wolpe reveals the many ways in which Australia was damaged by Donald...
07.06.2023
Andrew Skeoch in conversation
In this episode, a conversation with Andrew Skeoch, author of the recently released book, Deep Listening to Nature. As one of Australia's best-known nature sound recordists, Skeoch’s work offers us an invitation and an opportunity to open our ears to...
06.30.2023
Tegan Bennett Daylight in conversation
In this episode, a conversation with author Tegan Bennet Daylight, centred around her new YA novel, Royals. A group of teenagers alone in an empty shopping centre, with everything they could possibly want ... and a baby? With no phones,...
06.23.2023
Aurelia Guo in conversation
In today’s episode, booksellers Justin Amalimal Cantrell and Nico Callaghan are joined by Aurelia Guo, a writer and researcher based in London, for a conversation centred on her book, World of Interiors. Of the book, Guo writes: “In World of...
06.15.2023
Ros Ben-Moshe in conversation
In this episode, an interview with Ros Ben-Moshe, author of The Laughter Effect, a powerful philosophy that enhances wellbeing and provides you with a road map to tap into the lighter side of life and awaken both your inner and...
06.08.2023
In conversation with Thomas Mayo and Kerry O'Brien
In this episode, Mary Crooks, executive director of the Victorian Women’s Trust, chairs a conversation with the authors of The Voice To Parliament Handbook, Thomas Mayo and Kerry O’Brien. The Voice to Parliament Handbook is an easy-to-follow guide for the millions...
06.02.2023
Sarah Street in conversation
In this episode, a conversation with Sarah Street, author of the new book, A Curse of Salt. Drawing comparisons to Brigid Kemmerer’s Cursebreakers series and Sarah J Maas's A Court of Thorns and Roses, Street’s debut novel is a reworking...
05.25.2023
Benjamin Hegarty in conversation
In this episode, a recording taken from an event at Readings Carlton, to celebrate the publication of Benjamin Hegarty’s book, The Made Up State: technology, trans femininity and Citizenship in Indonesia. In The Made Up State, anthropologist Benjamin Hegarty contends...
05.19.2023
Mikki Brammer in conversation
In this episode, a conversation with Mikki Brammer. Her new novel, The Collected Regrets of Clover, is a big-hearted and life-affirming novel that turns the normally taboo subject of death into a reason to celebrate life. It's a sparkling debut...
05.12.2023
Alexis Wright in conversation
This episode features a live event recording taken of a conversation between Alexis Wright and Ivor Indyk, to celebrate the publication of Wright’s new novel, Praiseworthy. Alexis Wright is a remarkable writer, originally hailing from the from the Waanyi nation...
05.12.2023
Kate J. Armstrong in conversation
In this episode, a conversation with Kate J. Armstrong, author of the new YA novel, Nightbirds. Set in a dazzling new fantasy world full of whispered secrets and political intrigue, the magic of women is outlawed but three girls with...
05.05.2023
Max Porter in conversation
In this episode, listen to a conversation between English author Max Porter and Readings Podcast Editor, Nico Callaghan. This recording is taken from an online event celebrating the release of Porter’s most recent novel, Shy.
05.05.2023
Saul Griffith in conversation
This episode features the recording of an online conversation focused on the newest edition of The Quarterly Essay, The Wires That Bind: Electrification and Community Renewal, penned by Saul Griffith. In this edition, inventor, engineer and visionary Saul Griffith reveals...

What's The Readings Podcast about?

Download our free app to listen on your phone

The Readings Podcast episodes:

The Comics Question: Notable Books of 2023 Part Two

Marina Kamenev in conversation

Samantha Harvey in conversation

Mykaela Saunders in conversation

The Comics Question: Notable Books of 2023 Part One with Bernard Caleo

Sonny Jane Wise in conversation

Fiona Sweet, new Executive Director and CEO of Stella, in conversation

Jeanine Leane in conversation

Alex Miller in conversation

Damien Linnane in conversation

Helen Hayward in conversation

Sam Sempill in conversation

Raymond Gaita in conversation

Robyn Annear in conversation

Ron Rash in conversation

Sara M Saleh in conversation

The Comics Question with Steve Mushin

Ellie And Sam Studd in conversation

Charlie Porter in conversation

Mistress Jane in conversation

The Comics Question with Sarah Firth

Zadie Smith in conversation

Mark Edele in conversation

Joel Deane in conversation

David McAllister in conversation

David Meagher in conversation

Siân Hughes in conversation

Tracey Kirkland and Gavin Fang in conversation

Eugen Bacon in onversation

Kate Grenville in conversation

A conversation about The Victorian Pride Centre

Polly Barton in conversation

The Comics Question with Michael Fikaris

Robert Skinner in conversation

Angela O'Keeffe in conversation

Om Dhuengel in conversation

Antony Loewenstein in conversation

Bruce Wolpe in conversation

Andrew Skeoch in conversation

Tegan Bennett Daylight in conversation

Aurelia Guo in conversation

Ros Ben-Moshe in conversation

In conversation with Thomas Mayo and Kerry O'Brien

Sarah Street in conversation

Benjamin Hegarty in conversation

Mikki Brammer in conversation

Alexis Wright in conversation

Kate J. Armstrong in conversation

Max Porter in conversation

Saul Griffith in conversation