Reviewed by Norrie Sanders What if your father told many tales of the Second World War, but somehow the real story was elusive, with three obscure years? What if he was sworn to secrecy, but you are intensely curious about the events that took place in those malignant times? This was the dilemma facing Neil
Reviewed by Richard Tutin What sets this book by international cricketer Dan Christian apart from the many cricketing books that are currently available? Surely the sport, like many other codes, has been well covered while every retiring cricketer seems to produce a memoir or autobiography soon after the conclusion of their playing career. The main
Reviewed by Gail McDonald Sheila Hancock is one of Britain’s most highly regarded and popular actors. Sheila received a Damehood for services to drama and charity in 2021; and only following the death of her husband John Thaw in 2002 took up writing. A memoir of their marriage The Two of Us was a number
Reviewed by Ian Lipke Comparisons drawn between John le Carre’s Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy and The Fourth Man are to be expected but have little substance. The books belong to different genres and were written for two very different audiences. However, this rarely stops exciting comparisons being made, because here in real life is the
Reviewed by Patricia Simms-Reeve So many superlatives have been attached to Chloe Hooper’s work and her latest titled Bedtime Story is no exception, having already attracted many accolades. In it, she considers, in range and depth, the problem she faced in preparing her two sons, the elder particularly, for the imminent death of their father, Don. Chloe
Reviewed by Ian Lipke The title of Ann-Marie Priest’s biography of the gifted Australian poet Gwen Harwood is a fine metonymic description. This poet is renowned for the brilliance, the intellectual toughness of her verse, while being as well known for her sense of the ridiculous and her capacity for hard physical labour. By the
Reviewed by Ian Lipke A biography of the Australian novelist, short story writer, and poet Katharine Susannah Prichard has been written by Nathan Hobby and released by Melbourne University Press. Long regarded as a notorious woman on the fringes marked by her literary powers and her left-wing politics, Prichard’s tortuous life has not been untangled
Reviewed by Ian Lipke Dr Nikki Stamp has written a memoir, a non-fiction form of writing that is like a biography but differs markedly from it. A memoir may be described as a record composed from personal observation and experience. Closely related to, and often confused with, autobiography, a memoir usually differs chiefly in the
Reviewed by Gail McDonald This biographical novel by Antony Jeffrey centres mainly on the story of his mother who is described as a brave and sensitive woman who never stopped caring for the people she loved. It is a story of love, loss and family and is the first novel written by Antony. He previously
Reviewed by Richard Tutin Those who survived the Holocaust of World War II have, over the years, slowly told their stories. For some, the trauma they suffered has been such that there has been a reluctance to say anything about it because of the pain they have suffered and are still suffering. Tony Bernard’s father
Reviewed by Wendy Lipke Margaret Cameron is new to sharing her work, but a brief conversation with a friend, who remarked that she’d seen it all and she could write a book, changed everything. As the author recalls, the assertion arrived like a wind-blown leaf in an overgrown conversational garden. I decided to write that
Reviewed by Richard Tutin Anyone who was interred in the Auschwitz prison camp during World War II was, more often than not, destined never to be released. Auschwitz has gone down in history as one of, if not the most, despicable places of death and torture created by human beings. It was a place where
Reviewed by Norrie Sanders How would you feel if you were happily working overseas, then arrested without trial and deported to another country and held indefinitely in custody by armed guards? All through no fault of your own. Such was the fate of Miyakatsu Koike, a Japanese national, working in Indonesia for a Japanese bank.
Reviewed by Clare Brook The general public has a fascination with sensational details surrounding murder. There have been many documentaries made to satisfy that curiosity, usually detailing the immediate evidence surrounding the physicality of the crime. I Am a Killer is based on the successful Netflix series of the same name. The aim of this
Reviewed by Gerard Healy A very interesting look inside the world of 1960s and 70s TV shows and later Hollywood movies, by brothers Ron Howard and Clint Howard. Ron is the better known of the two with his childhood appearances in The Andy Griffith Show and Happy Days and his later successful directing career. He