Kathryn's Inbox

Carolyn Huynh's debut novel is a beautiful story about generations of cursed women. It is well known in Little Sagon that the Durong sisters are cursed--that the women in the family never find love or happiness, and that their daughters always give birth to more daughters, not sons. Then one day, Mai Nguyen hears a surprising prediction from her trusted psychic, a son will be born into the family at last, lifting the curse. In preparation for this even, she begins reuniting the women of the family, with surprising consequences. This was an amusing, and occasionally heartbreaking, read about a family of women who not only believed themselves to be cursed, but the hardships the encountered in their lives--coming to the United States from Vietnam as refugees, rebuilding their lives and trying to shape better lives for their daughters, all of whom have different hopes and aspirations from their mothers. Parts of the story reminded me a little of The Joy Luck Club, while some of the nov...

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  No amount of fire or freshness can challenge what a man will store up in his ghostly heart ~ F. Scott Fitzgerald, The Great Gatsby

The collective noun for a group of porcupines is a prickle.

A killer intent on avenging past wrongs is at the heart of this twisty crime novel set in Auckland. Hana Westerman is a Maori detective, and a singly mother, working in the Central Investigations Branch. She has always had to walk a very difficult line between her culture and her work, and even more so when she discovers a link between a number of supposedly unrelated murders and the colonisation of New Zealand. While it would be easy to write Better the Blood off as yet another story about a serial killer whose crimes are investigated by a cop who has all kinds of trouble in their personal life, that would mean totally ignoring one of the finest, and key points of difference in this novel--it's intimate glimpse into past wrongs, Maori culture and the effect those wrongs have in modern day New Zealand.  Initially, I had trouble getting into this one as much of it is quite confronting and I wasn't in a great headspace. However, a second reading, when I was in a better mindset, ...

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  I took a deep breath and listened to the old brag of my heart: I am, I am, I am ~  Sylvia Plath , The Bell Jar

Meet Tessa, a hardworking student with a tragic past who is in her upper years of a screenwriting course. Meet Jonathan, a Hollywood actor with famous parents who has seemingly lived a perfect, privileged life. What could the pair possibly have in common? Well, there is the small issue of a drunken one-night stand that has just made headlines. Then there is the fact that Jonathan's 'people'  are in damage control mode after he has lashed out at a reporter. To them, Tessa seems like the perfect distraction. Orchestrate a fake romance between the two, and make the bad publicity go away. Even better is the fact that Tessa desperately needs a leading actor to star in her latest film project. But what happens when the pair fall in love for real? TJ Ryan's Between the Lines is a superbly written romance packed full of depth, heart wrenching situations and a whole lot of heart. Tessa and Jonathan are characters to fall in love with, while they fall toward an explosive ending....

  Snails can sleep for up to three years.

There is no denying it. Eddie Betts is a true AFL legend, having played a whopping 300 games (or possibly more,) and kicking more than 600 goals during his time with Carlton and the Adelaide Crows. His goals were often spectacular, some kicked from odd angles which led to a portion of Adelaide Oval being lovingly renamed Eddie Betts pocket by fans. In later years, he became an advocate for Literacy and Learning through Eddie's Lil' Homies a clever series of children's books which also promote kindness, acceptance and equality. ( Read more about Eddie's Lil' Homies here. ) The Boy From Boomerang Crescent tells the full story behind the footballing legend. Growing up between Port Lincoln and Kalgoolie is tough, and more so for those who are still feeling the impact colonialism. Sadly, racism and police targeting Aboriginal people is a way of life (so much so that when Betts was about eight or nine years old, he was wrongfully arrested when police apparently mistook h...

   “All great achievements require time.”  ~ Maya Angelou

Your small intestine is longer than your large intestine ... and you probably remember learning that in primary school.

Aussie author Gabrielle Williams takes a true--and bizarre--event and unsolved crime and shapes it into a story of love and loss. In August 1986 a group purporting to be the Australian Cultural Terrorists stole Picasso's Weeping Woman from the wall of the National Gallery and held it to ransom. Their demand was increased funding to the arts. The painting was eventually discovered, undamaged in a locker at Spencer Street Station. The perpetrators have never been caught, despite a large scale investigation.  The Guy, The Girl, The Artist and His Ex offers a wholly fictional, and very entertaining, account of how the painting could have been stolen, told from the perspective of four characters. There is Guy, who is in his final year of high school and set to fail his exams, Rafi who came to Australia from Brazil with her mother to live with her uncle after a terrible event, Luke an artist directly connected to the crime who is too selfish and immature to sort out his many interperson...

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  “No need to hurry. No need to sparkle. No need to be anybody but oneself.” ~ Virginia Woolf

Greta Thunberg is a name that will be instantly recognisable to many people across the globe thanks to her work in environmental and climate change activism. Our House is on Fire is, in one part, the behind the scenes biography of her complex family life, and the events that led her toward activism. In another, it has a lot of information about the family's beliefs, passion and desire to make a difference.  Narrated by Malena Ernman, the biography tells of her life as an opera singer who made a living travelling and working throughout Europe and how things began to change suddenly when her oldest daughter, Greta stopped eating and spoke very little. Their family life improves after both of her daughters, Greta and Beata are given formal diagnosis and find ways to convert their so-called problems into superpowers, and how Greta converts her concerns about climate change into an unstoppable call to arms, through messages that made their way right across the globe. Beata, meanwhile,...

Colleen Hoover's latest offering is a short, heartwarming and occasionally over-emotional novella that acts as a sequel to both Finding Cinderella (itself a companion novel and sequel to the Hopeless series,) and her stand-alone novel All Your Perfects.  It's thanksgiving break, and Six is sad, and her boyfriend Daniel is sad because Six is sad, and it all comes down to the secret they have been keeping from everyone. And then it turns out that two strangers--Quinn and Graham--hold the key to helping them find their way. There is no denying it, this is definitely a story written for diehard fans who want to revisit their favourite characters and know what happened next. In many respects it works as a lovely crossover, with each pair able to give the other exactly what they needed. Unfortunately, it also feels overly sweet in places and the situation tied up a bit too well. The characters themselves, particularly Daniel and Six, come across as one-dimensional and shallow, in sp...

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