Emily Paull

The Natural Way of Things Charlotte Wood Allen and Unwin 2015 Some reviews are incredibly hard to write not because you don't know what to say but because there's too much to say, and the sheer skill of the book itself makes you feel inarticulate by comparison.  This was my experience of The Natural Way of Things , the new novel by Charlotte Wood which will be released at the end of this month.  Don't let the beautiful cover fool you: this is not a happy hop, skip and jump through nature. But more on this cover later!!! The Natural Way of Things  begins when two women wake to find themselves prisoners in an abandoned rural property, guarded by a strange, mismatched trio of guards.  There are a number of other women imprisoned with them, but the points of view from which we enter the story belong to Yolanda and Verla, with Verla's voice in particular being the one that helps the reader make the most sense of what is going on.   Something has made all of...

Double Madness Caroline de Costa Margaret River Press, 2015 My mother, Megan, is an avid reader of crime novels, so when a new one gets sent my way, I defer to her higher knowledge of the genre... here's what she has to say about the new crime novel published this year by local mavericks, Margaret River Press Caroline de Costa’s first crime novel takes place in and around Cairns in Far North Queensland in the aftermath of Yasi, a category five cyclone which made news around the world due to its level of destruction.  Dr Tim Ingram and his wife discover the partially decomposed body of a woman in the aftermath of the cyclone, a woman who was not a cyclone casualty.  A missing husband, an abandoned car, a fortress home where the impeccable garden has not been cleaned up after the cyclone, and a bevy of doctors and specialists associated with the local hospital provide mystery and intrigue.  Local Detective Senior Constable Cass Diamond, recently relocated t...

This month was a busy one-- there's just something about the middle of the year!  I am back studying for another semester (or trimester as they have at Deakin) and this time around I am doing two units instead of one.  Interestingly, this week one of my units is focussing on reviewing!  I still managed to get through a few books in August, and some of them were pretty amazing!  Without any further ado, here are the books I devoured in the last four weeks... My Brilliant Friend by Elena Ferrante There is a lot of buzz around Elena Ferrante's Neapolitan series, which wraps up in September with a fourth instalment.  Ferrante is an Italian literary sensation, and very few people have actually met her or know her true identity.  Notoriously private, she never grants repeat interviews to any publication, choosing to maintain her private life, and allowing people to interpret what they will about her from her books, which seem to be highly autobiographical...