Spectrum
A local pop star is born: Becca Hatch’s club classics are so good
The Western Sydney singer’s debut release is a mini dance-pop masterpiece.
- by Robert Moran
Latest
At Australia’s richest landscape prize, art conquered politics
This year’s $100,000 Hadley’s Art Prize offered a range of ways of seeing our wildest terrain.
- by John McDonald
Opinion
WordPlay
Hundreds of words have been added to the dictionary this year. Which ones will last?
Enshittification, this is your moment.
- by David Astle
‘I hope it sticks to them like a tick’: A writer’s gift to her stalker
Author Ella Baxter has an unusual request for the person who sent her violent and sexual letters.
- by Melanie Kembrey
Opinion
Opinion
We desperately need to improve our concentration. Here’s a novel idea
In a world of fleeting social media grabs and instant gratification, how can we learn to focus?
- by Richard Glover
‘I write about sports; it’s what my head is filled with’
Two of Joseph O’Neill’s novels have been shortlisted for the Booker. His latest has echoes of Heart of Darkness in its quest for a brilliant teenage African footballer.
- by Jason Steger
At the heart of a love story, an urge to understand Country
Anita Heiss’ second historical novel is an act of remembering, educative about sorry business and the need for empathy.
- by Lucy Sussex
It may be a miniature, but this story of music strikes the right note
Andrew Ford speculates that music might predate speech. But in his informative “shortest history”, he insists that music is not a universal language.
- by Barney Zwartz
What to read next: The brilliant Rachel Cusk and a striking memoir
Our reviewers cast their eyes over recent fiction and non-fiction releases.
- by Cameron Woodhead and Fiona Capp
Good people use exclamation marks! The rest of you are jerks
We’re all just trying to get through our days. Exclamation marks make it nicer!
- by Robert Moran
Queer lovers doubling up in the face of society’s hostility
In Dylin Hardcastle’s second novel, the two main characters face pressure not to be their true selves.
- by Declan Fry