I’m waiting for… 2024 edition

Proving that I don’t actually care about my never-really-shrinking-TBR-list is this list of new releases that are on my radar for 2024. Continue reading

I’m waiting for… 2023 edition

Proving that I don’t actually care about my never-really-shrinking-TBR-list is this list of new releases that are on my radar for 2023. Continue reading

Bookish (and not so bookish) Thoughts

01. I’ve had so much fun over the last two weeks – Home, I’m Darling (the sets! The costumes!); a long lunch at Moondog (I can highly recommend the avocado dip paired with a Moondog pale ale); Pseudo Echo, Rick Astley, and a-ha in concert at Rockford Winery (a-ha had the top billing but really, it was all Rick), and… Continue reading

The Top 50 from the Best Books of 2019 List of Lists

This is my annual community service to book-bloggers – a list of the books that appear most frequently on the 56 lists that I listed on Best Books of 2019 – A List of Lists. Continue reading

Bookish (and not so bookish) Thoughts

01. I’ve been too busy to study the 2020 Melbourne Food and Wine Festival program closely but a few things did catch my eye – Women’s Weekly Birthday Cakes exhibition and this focus on food and wine from the volcanic region of Italy. Continue reading

Bookish (and not so bookish) Thoughts

01. I had an ace day in the Yarra Valley last week (much wine, a superb lunch at Tarra Warra, and my first visit to Four Pillars distillery where the sales staff probably made their monthly quota after our visit – specifically ‘Espy’ Gin, breakfast negroni, and because I love negronis, this). Continue reading

Bookish (and not so bookish) Thoughts

01. It’s school holidays in Australia. We spent a few days with family in Kyneton (with some mountain-biking in Harcourt and a hike to the summit of Hanging Rock). Continue reading

Machines Like Me by Ian McEwan

Ian McEwan sure does have the corner on the middle-class-white-men-having-existential-crises market, doesn’t he?

In Machines Like Me, McEwan conjures a world not quite like the one we know. It’s the eighties in Britain – the Falklands War has been lost, Margaret Thatcher battles Tony Benn for power and Alan Turing achieves a breakthrough in artificial intelligence. Continue reading

Andrew Sean Greer at the Wheeler Centre

We got off to a fabulous start when host Benjamin Law noted Andrew Sean Greer’s striking leather pants and asked, “Who are you wearing tonight?” Andrew obliged – the pants were bespoke, made for him in Paris, and his striped blazer was purchased in Milan on a post-Pulitzer spending spree. For those who had not read Andrew’s Pulitzer Prize winning novel, Less, this exchange may have seemed farcical, however, those familiar with the character of Arthur Less immediately knew they were in for an entertaining evening (bespoke clothing occupies Arthur’s time in Paris). Continue reading