Real Estate by Deborah Levy

$22.99 AUD

Category: Biography & Memoir

Everybody: A Book about Freedom by Olivia Laing

$49.95 AUD

Category: New Hardbacks

'Simply one of our most exciting writers' Observer 'A free-wheeling and joyful exploration of the works and lives of a range of artists and thinkers who brought libidinal and creative energy together with spectacular results' Jack Halberstam The body is a source of pleasure and of pain, at once hopeless ly vulnerable and radiant with power. At a moment in which basic rights are once again imperilled, Olivia Laing conducts an ambitious investigation into the body and its discontents, using the life of the renegade psychoanalyst Wilhelm Reich to chart a daring course through the long struggle for bodily freedom, from gay rights and sexual liberation to feminism and the civil rights movement. Drawing on her own experiences in protest and alternative medicine, and travelling from Weimar Berlin to the prisons of McCarthy-era America, she grapples with some of the most significant and complicated figures of the past century, among them Nina Simone, Christopher Isherwood, Andrea Dworkin, Sigmund Freud, Susan Sontag and Malcolm X. Despite its many burdens, the body remains a source of power, even in an era as technologized and automated as our own. Everybody is an examination of the forces arranged against freedom and a celebration of how ordinary human bodies can resist oppression and reshape the world. 'A brave writer whose books open up fundamental questions about life and art' Telegraph ...Show more

Sex, Lies and Question Time: The successes and struggles of women in Australia’s parliament by Kate Ellis

$32.99 AUD

Category: Australian Non fiction

In Sex, Lies and Question Time, former MP Kate Ellis looks at what it is really like to be a woman in Australian politics today.   In 2017, a survey showed zero per cent of young Australian women would consider entering politics. Zero. In a time when we critically need women in our parliament, and in a country that was an early leader in women's political participation, there is a perception that women and politics don’t mix. Shocking incidents have exposed the sexism that women in politics face from opposition, the media, the public, even their own colleagues. And those headlines only tell half the story. In Sex, Lies and Question Time, Kate Ellis tells the sometimes enraging, often funny and incredibly honest full story of women in Australian politics today. As well as sharing the experiences of her own fifteen years in parliament, Kate has spoken to politicians from across Australia’s political spectrum, including former Prime Minister Julia Gillard, Julia Bishop, Penny Wong, Linda Burney, Sarah Hanson Young and Pauline Hanson. Kate explores issues like sexism, bullying, motherhood, appearances, social media, racism, the sisterhood and, of course, sex. But she also celebrates everything Australian female politicians have achieved. Because most of all this book is a powerful call for Australian women to inspire to political leadership, to shape a fairer Australia – where ‘women’s issues’ are everyone’s issues. Why would a woman want to go into politics? From where most women stand, Parliament looks like a toxic boys’ club. Here, Kate Ellis bursts the Canberra bubble to reveal what life is like for our female MPs, and why it’s the best and worst job in the world.   ...Show more

I Belong Here - A Journey along the Backbone of Britain by Anita Sethi

$39.99 AUD

Category: Natural History and Environment

One woman's journey of reclamation through natural landscapes as she contemplates identity and womanhood, nature, place and belonging.   Anita Sethi was on a journey through Northern England in Summer 2019 when she became the victim of a racially motivated hate crime. The crime was a vicious attack on her right to exist in a place on account of her race. After the event Anita experienced panic attacks and anxiety. A crushing sense of claustrophobia made her long for wide open spaces, to breathe deeply in the great outdoors. She was intent on not letting her experience stop her from traveling freely and without fear.   Between the route from Liverpool to Newcastle lays the Pennines, known as the backbone of Britain. That backbone runs through the north and also strongly connects north with south, east with west--it's a place of borderlands and limestone, of rivers and scars, of fells and forces. The Pennines called to Anita with a magnetic force; although a racist had told her to leave, she felt drawn to further explore the area she regards as her home, to immerse herself deeply in place. Anita's journey through the natural landscapes of the North is one of reclamation, a way of saying that this is her land too and she belongs in the UK as a brown woman, as much as a white man does.   We're living in an era of increased hostility in which more people of color around the world are being told to go back; strong statements of belonging are needed more than ever. Anita's journey gives her the perspective to reflect upon the important issues encompassed in her experience of abuse including speaking out, gaslighting, trauma, kindness, and notions of strength. Her journey transforms what began as an ugly experience of hate into one offering hope and finding beauty after brutality.   Anita transforms her personal experience into one of universal resonance, offering a call to action, to keep walking onwards, forging a path through and beyond pain. Every footstep taken is an act of persistence. Every word written against the rising tide of hate speech, such as this book, is an act of resistance. ...Show more

The Mysterious Correspondent - New Stories by Marcel Proust; Charlotte Mandell (Translator)

$34.99 AUD

Category: Fiction

Newly discovered stories from one of the great storytellers of the twentieth century. Throughout Proust's life, nine of his short stories remained unseen-the writer never spoke of them. Why did he choose not to publish them along with the others? One possible answer is that he was developing his themes in preparation for his masterpiece, In Search of Lost Time; another is that the stories were too audacious-too near to life-for the censorious society of the time. In these stories, published here for the first time, we find an intimate picture of a young author full of darkness and melancholy, longing to reveal his true self to the world. ...Show more

The High House by Jessie Greengrass

$39.99 AUD

Category: Fiction

Crisis slid from distant threat to imminent probability and we tuned it out like static.

Lean Fall Stand by Jon McGregor

$37.99 AUD

Category: Fiction

'A beautiful piece of work ... it leaves the reader moved and subtly changed, as if she had become part of the story' Hilary Mantel The highly anticipated new novel from the Costa-award winning, three-times Booker-longlisted author of Reservoir 13. When an Antarctic research expedition goes wrong, the consequences are far-reaching - for the men involved and for their families back home.   Robert 'Doc' Wright, a veteran of Antarctic field work, holds the clues to what happened, but he is no longer able to communicate them. While Anna, his wife, navigates the sharp contours of her new life as a carer, Robert is forced to learn a whole new way to be in the world.   Award-winning novelist Jon McGregor returns with a stunning novel that mesmerizingly and tenderly unpicks the notion of heroism and explores the indomitable human impulse to tell our stories - even when words fail us.  A meditation on the line between sacrifice and selfishness this is a story of the undervalued, unrecognised courage it can take just to get through the day. to tell our stories - even when words fail us.  A meditation on the line between sacrifice and selfishness this is a story of the undervalued, unrecognised courage it can take just to get through the day.to tell our stories - even when words fail us.  A meditation on the line between sacrifice and selfishness this is a story of the undervalued, unrecognised courage it can take just to get through the day.to tell our stories - even when words fail us.  A meditation on the line between sacrifice and selfishness this is a story of the undervalued, unrecognised courage it can take just to get through the day. ...Show more

My Year of Living Vulnerably by Rick Morton

$34.99 AUD

Category: Australian Non fiction

From Rick Morton, the author of the bestselling, critically acclaimed memoir One Hundred Years of Dirt comes a dazzlingly brilliant book about love, trauma and recovery, My Year of Living Vulnerably. 'Wonderfully readable and wide-ranging exploration of the visible and invisible touchstones of our liv es ... this is nourishing reading for our lonely, frightening and fraught times. Part self-help book, part treatise on the importance of love, kindness and forgiveness ... Morton is a national treasure and we need more like him.' Books+Publishing In early 2019, Rick Morton, author of acclaimed, bestselling memoir One Hundred Years of Dirt, was diagnosed with complex post-traumatic stress disorder - which, as he says, is just a fancy way of saying that one of the people who should have loved him the most during childhood didn't. So, over the course of twelve months, he went on a journey to rediscover love. To get better. Not cured, not fixed. Just, better. This is a book about his journey to betterness, his year of living vulnerably. It's a book about love. What love is, how we see it, what forms it takes, how we practice it in our lives, what it means to us, and how we really, really can't live without it, even if, like Rick for many years, we think we can. As he says: 'People think they want cars - and they do, to get to jobs and appointments in cities and regions where public transport has failed them. But what gets them into those cars, out of the house, out of bed for God's sake, is love.' Praise for A Hundred Years of Dirt 'Morton is fresh ... He's brilliant.' Helen Elliott, The Monthly 'Dark and provocative ... It's one of the saddest books I have read in a while, and one of the most honest .... I think this book should be read by every Australian.' Stephen Romei, The Australian 'Morton is a crack storyteller and his words and stories are infused with genuine compassion.' Christos Tsiolkas ...Show more

The God Equation by Michio Kaku

$35.00 AUD

Category: Science

This is the story of a quest: to find a Theory of Everything. Einstein dedicated his life to seeking this elusive Holy Grail, a single, revolutionary 'god equation' which would tie all the forces in the universe together, yet never found it. Some of the greatest minds in physics took up the search, from Stephen Hawking to Brian Greene. None have yet succeeded. In The God Equation, renowned theoretical physicist Michio Kaku takes the reader on a mind-bending ride through the twists and turns of this epic journey: a mystery that has fascinated him for most of his life. He guides us through the key debates in modern physics, from Newton's law of gravity via relativity and quantum mechanics to the latest developments in string theory. It is a tale of dazzling breakthroughs and crushing dead ends, illuminated by Kaku's clarity, storytelling flair and infectious enthusiasm. The object of the quest is now within sight: we are closer than ever to achieving the most ambitious undertaking in the history of science. If successful, the Theory of Everything could simultaneously unlock the deepest mysteries of space and time, and fulfil that most ancient and basic of human desires - to understand the meaning of our lives. ...Show more

A Restless Hungry Feeling: The Double Life of Bob Dylan Vol. 1: 1941-1975 by Clinton Heylin

$65.00 AUD

Category: Music

In 2016 it was announced that Bob Dylan had sold his personal archive to the George Kaiser Foundation in Tulsa, Oklahoma, reportedly for $22 million (and $64 million in tax relief). As the boxes started to arrive, the Foundation asked Clinton Heylin - author of the acclaimed Dylan behind the Shades (199 1; rev. 2011) and 'perhaps the world's authority on all things Dylan' (Rolling Stone) - to assess the material that they had been given. What he found in Tulsa - as well as what he gleaned from other papers he had recently been given access to by Sony and the Dylan office - so changed his understanding of the artist, in particular of his creative process, that he became convinced that his biography needed to be completely rewritten. It turns out that most of what we thought we knew is wrong - and in particular, that Dylan is the notoriously unreliable narrator of his own story. With fresh and revealing information on every page, the first volume, A Restless Hungry Feeling, tells the story of Dylan's meteoric rise to fame- his arrival in New York in early 1961, where he is embraced by the folk scene; his elevation to spokesman of a generation whose protest songs deliver the soundtrack for the burgeoning Civil Rights movement; his alleged betrayal when he 'goes electric' at Newport in 1965; his subsequent controversial world tour with a rock 'n' roll band; and the recording of his three undisputed masterpieces- Bringing it All Back Home, Highway 61 Revisited and Blonde on Blonde. Dylan is at the peak of his fame when in July 1966 he reportedly crushes his motorbike in Woodstock, upstate New York, and disappears from public view. When he re-emerges, he looks different, his voice sounds different, his songs are different; he would not tour again until 1974. There is unlikely to be any more 'autobiography' after Chronicles, and Dylan is never going to authorise an official biography; Clinton's meticulously researched, all-encompassing and consistently revelatory account is the closest we will ever get to a definitive life. ...Show more

Under a White Sky: The Nature of the Future by Elizabeth Kolbert

$29.99 AUD

Category: Philosophy, Politics & Current Affairs

The author of the international bestseller The Sixth Extinction returns to humanity's transformative impact on the environment, now asking- After doing so much damage, can we change nature, this time to save it? Elizabeth Kolbert has become one of the most important writers on the environment. Now she i nvestigates the immense challenges humanity faces as we scramble to reverse, in a matter of decades, the effects we've had on the atmosphere, the oceans, the world's forests and rivers - on the very topography of the globe. In her trademark persuasive and darkly comic prose, Kolbert introduces myriad innovations that offer ways to avert disaster - or may produce new disasters, ones that haven't been and perhaps cannot be anticipated. We encounter the scientists attempting to save the Devils Hole pupfish, the rarest fish species in the world, who occupy a single pool in a limestone cavern in the middle of the Mojave desert; engineers who are turning carbon emissions to stone; resilient 'super coral' created via assisted evolution to survive a hotter globe; and researchers who are contemplating shooting tiny diamonds into the stratosphere to scatter sunlight back to space, changing the sky from blue to white. One way to look at human civilization, says Kolbert, is as a ten-thousand-year exercise in defying nature. Paradoxically, the very sorts of interventions that have imperiled our planet are increasingly seen as the only hope for its salvation. ...Show more

Letters to Camondo by Edmund de Waal

$32.99 AUD

Category: New Hardbacks

63 rue de Monceau, ParisDear friend, As you may have guessed by now, I am not in your house by accident. I know your street rather well. Count Moise de Camondo lived a few doors away from Edmund de Waal's forebears, the Ephrussi, first encountered in his bestselling memoir The Hare with Amber Eyes. Like the Ephrussi, the Camondos were part of belle epoque high society. They were also targets of anti-semitism.Camondo created a spectacular house and filled it with the greatest private collection of French eighteenth-century art for his son to inherit. But when Nissim was killed in the First World War, it became a memorial and, on the Count's death, was bequeathed to France. The Musee Nissim de Camondo has remained unchanged since 1936. Edmund de Waal explores the lavish rooms and detailed archives and uncovers new layers to the family story. In a haunting series of letters addressed to the Count, he tells us what happened next.   ...Show more