Crime spree

Crime fiction remains one of the most popular genres in literature, so here are five novels by writers from Italy, Japan, Israel, New Zealand and Finland to check out over the holidays.

The story of Santa

We all know that Santa Claus comes from the North Pole every year to leave presents around the Christmas Tree, but his evolution from Christian myth to modern fairy tale is just as fascinating.

The morning star

Much of the art – and art criticism – of today is a vapid exercise in politically correct posturing rather than an imaginative exploration of the human condition, but the success of Karl Ove Knausgaard’s challenging works shows the public’s hunger for something more.

Swallows on Amazon

“Critic Swallows Book” collects 22 diverse essays from the long form, online only Sydney Review of Books to celebrate its ten-year anniversary.

Here be dragons

Alastair Newton Brown’s Here Be Dragons, a powerful indictment of the eye for an eye mentality of war, is coming to the screen at Dendy Newtown in Sydney, with a portion of proceeds going to the charitable Veterans Film Festival and its film industry careers program, Screen Warriors.

The Conversation’s best books of 2023

The Conversation asked 20 of its regular contributors to nominate their favourite books of the year. Their choices were diverse, intriguing and sometimes surprising.

The great Australian novel

The newly published Cambridge History of the Australian Novel considers the role of Australian fiction at home and abroad, its perspectives on the nation’s history and the ever changing landscape of writing, publishing and reading.

The Visionaries

“The Visionaries” tells the story of four indomitable women who pursued their their own visions of a truly free and open society at a time of brutal authoritarianism and cataclysmic war.

Jaw jaw about war, war

In a world riven by war in Europe and the Middle East, the art of conversation offers people a chance to think as well as communicate what they are thinking, and few people love such conversations more than Rai Gaita.

Face to face

New research looks at how the human face is represented in writing from the medieval to contemporary eras, revealing how we have interpreted human emotion over the centuries.

The horror, the horror

Halloween is over for another year, but adult horror fiction can be enjoyed at any time of year, and three new Australian novels – Bunny, Bitters and Blackwater – rank with some of the classics of the genre.

Losing a friend

It’s as fashionable to denigrate Friends these days as it was to love the show in its heyday, but the death of Matthew Perry has hit many people hard, a reminder that the happier, more carefree times of our youth are over.