This is a book that, for me, started slowly and gained momentum as I read. To be honest, I only picked it because it had a "J" in the title. I'm combining the Australian Women Writers challenge with the Aussie Readers "Challenge with a Twist": each month you have to read a book whose title or aut...
Sixty Lights is the captivating chronicle of Lucy Strange, an independent girl growing up in the Victorian world. From her childhood in Australia through to her adolescence in England and Bombay and finally to London, Lucy is fascinated by light and by the new photographic technology. Her percept...
Victoria Morrell was once a great artist. She led the high life - living and working in Paris, mixing with the artists of the Surrealist movement. Her work was largely forgotten in the fifties and sixties, but was rediscovered in the seventies when she became something of a cult figure on the Lon...
After the Battle of Britain he talked more frequently of the war, but it was the Blitz, in particular, that most aroused his excitement. In the air offensive on 15 September, Southampton, Manchester, Bristol, Liverpool and Cardiff were all bombed. Nicholas talked of Hawker Hurricanes and Supermar...
And again feeling or instinct flickered unacknowledged between them. Yukio and Mitsuko left swiftly, their twin shapes bounding, released and joyful, down the long zigzag stairway. They were heading to a nightclub in Neukölln, they said, to hear a famous Japanese DJ play remixes of David Bowie. S...
The quirk of any story, the element of return. It was getting dark by the time Catherine made her way back towards Darlinghurst. In the twilight there were flocks of bats flying away from the botanical gardens; Catherine could see them silhouetted against the amethyst sky. What a primitive life f...