Nonfiction November kicks off today with My Year in Nonfiction, hosted by Heather at Based on a True Story. Strictly speaking, I should call it Memoir November (Memvember?!) – doesn’t have quite the same ring but it is more accurate in my case, given that the majority of my nonfiction reading is memoir. Specifically, I’ve … Continue reading →| booksaremyfavouriteandbest
01. Allow me another proud-mum-moment. My daughter won the art prize for her folio (her pieces were all textiles). 02. Approximately 1000 words away from finishing uni for the year. 03. British Film Festival (on my list: Hamnet, The Thing with Feathers, The Choral, & Sons, Four Mothers, Re-creation, The Golden Spurtle, and Dragonfly). 04. … Continue reading →| booksaremyfavouriteandbest
Small Rain by Garth Greenwell is one of the most creative books I’ve read this year. Not creative in that it plays with style or structure, but simply for its somehow wholly engaging focus on the micro detail (and in doing so, tells a macro story). What a strange thing a body is, I thought, … Continue reading →| booksaremyfavouriteandbest
Sample Saturday is when I wade through the eleventy billion samples I have downloaded on my Kindle. I’m slowly chipping away and deciding whether it’s buy or bye. Notes to John by Joan Didion Why I have it: Joan Didon on therapy? No brainer. Summary: In November 1999, Joan Didion began seeing a psychiatrist because, … Continue reading →| booksaremyfavouriteandbest
01. Yay! MTC’s 2026 season launch. I was thrilled to hear Joanna Murray-Smith speak about her new play, an adaption of Chekhov’s Uncle Vanya. And cannot wait for the stage production of Forster’s A Room With a View. 02. And on the topic of theatre – saw MTC’s incredible adaption of Rebecca this week. It … Continue reading →| booksaremyfavouriteandbest
Sample Saturday is when I wade through the eleventy billion samples I have downloaded on my Kindle. I’m slowly chipping away and deciding whether it’s buy or bye.| booksaremyfavouriteandbest
01. The Mourning After is a project that invites people to explore grief in all its forms. It’s focused on grief as a social practice and aims to improve ‘grief literacy’. The pro…| booksaremyfavouriteandbest
It’s that time of the year when newspapers and magazines publish their ‘Best of 2024’ lists. Lists usually begin appearing early November and keep going until the end of the year – I will keep addi…| booksaremyfavouriteandbest
10 posts published by Kate W during October 2025| booksaremyfavouriteandbest
All I can conclude after reading Among Friends by Hal Ebbott is that Hal must be among friends in the editing and publishing industry because I’m unsure how this novel has got as far as it has. Reasons why I thought it was dire: 1. The similes. All the similes. In every paragraph. And they … Continue reading →| booksaremyfavouriteandbest
01. Italian Film Festival at the lovely Westgarth Theatre (I’m obsessed with the art deco features, including the tiled floor). Saw Diamonds – lush and heartwarming. 02. Three of my four babies are/were in different parts of the world (far from Melbourne). One returned this week – so happy to have him home safely from … Continue reading →| booksaremyfavouriteandbest
Cult Bride by Liz Cameron As I was engrossed in Cameron’s account of how she was lured into the cult, JMS, and anxiously awaiting the bit where she detailed her escape, she states that we ought not watch docos or read books about cults because it sheds no light, provides no better understanding of cult … Continue reading →| booksaremyfavouriteandbest
Sample Saturday is when I wade through the eleventy billion samples I have downloaded on my Kindle. I’m slowly chipping away and deciding whether it’s buy or bye.| booksaremyfavouriteandbest
November is the month for #ALLTHEREADING and Nonfiction November is back with a full schedule of topics to focus our nonfiction reading.| booksaremyfavouriteandbest
Guten Abend! Yes, the calendar has just flipped into October but I’m fairly sure that other readers are doing what I’m doing… that is, making November reading plans. We have to be…| booksaremyfavouriteandbest
Well, after two funny collections about women and their relationships, Roxane Gay’s Difficult Women brought me back to reality with a thud. There are 21 stories in Difficult Women, and most h…| booksaremyfavouriteandbest
Yep, running out of time to draw a line under the reviews for the year. Some of these I’ve been meaning to write for eleven months. Lucky it doesn’t actually matter…| booksaremyfavouriteandbest
To be honest, I was still dining on details of The Salt Path scandal, when I began I Want Everything by Dominic Amerena. I Want Everything is more a story about a literary mystery rather than a sca…| booksaremyfavouriteandbest
Lisa at ANZ LitLovers has just announced a new reading event – Short Story September.| booksaremyfavouriteandbest
Short story collections usually mean hits and misses – it’s rare that I rave about a whole collection (the last time was here). Games and Rituals by Katherine Heiny is absolutely worth …| booksaremyfavouriteandbest
I enjoy Katherine Heiny’s writing. She makes me laugh and I’m quite okay with the odd boundary that she pushes. Her novels are terrific but I reckon it’s in short stories where sh…| booksaremyfavouriteandbest
So many ways to focus ones reading in March: Women’s Prize, Stella Prize, Reading Ireland Month… I try to do a little of each. This time, two audios (the wait-list on hard copies at the…| booksaremyfavouriteandbest
There is so much to Elin Cullhed’s Euphoria, I hardly know where to begin. Perhaps an appropriate starting point is that I found this novel wholly absorbing. Euphoria is an account of Sylvia …| booksaremyfavouriteandbest
Welcome to #6Degrees. Annabel Smith and Emma Chapman began the 6 Degrees of Separation meme in 2014 (and I took over in 2016). The meme was inspired by Hungarian writer and poet Frigyes Karinthy. I…| booksaremyfavouriteandbest
