SUNDAY SHOUT-OUT

Is there ever such a thing as too many books? I don’t think there are too many books to read, but there can definitely be too many to review. Often I’m sent books and, with an already sagging review shelf, these unsolicited books often end being overlooked – I just can’t fit them in to my schedule. Sunday Shout-Out aims to acknowledge these books and the publishers who have sent them to me.

Sunday Shout-Out is bookish meme hosted by Monique of Write Note Reviews. If you’re a book blogger and you want to join in, just:

• Share the title, author, blurb and image from a book (or more than one) you want to acknowledge
• Share the genre, price and link to the publisher so readers can follow up if they like the sound of the book
• Ping back to Write Note Reviews in your post.

1. Game by Trevor Shearston (fiction, $29.99) – courtesy of Allen & Unwin.

It is 1865. For three years Ben Hall and the men riding with him have been lords of every road in mid-western New South Wales from Bathurst to Goulburn, Lambing Flat to Forbes. But with the Harbourers’ Act made law, coach escorts armed now with the new Colt revolving rifle, and mailbags more often containing cheques than banknotes, being game is no longer enough. The road of negotiated surrender is closed. Jack Gilbert has shot dead a police sergeant at Jugiong. Constable Nelson, father of eight, lies buried at Collector, killed by John Dunn. Neither time did Ben pull the fatal trigger, but he too will hang if ever the three are taken. Harry Hall is seven. Ben has not seen the boy since his wife Biddy left to live with another man, taking Harry with her. The need to see his son, to be in some way a father again, has grown urgent. But how much time is left before the need to give the game away and disappear becomes the greater urgency?

2. And Then Like my Dreams by Margaret Rose Stringer (memoir, $26.99) – courtesy of Fremantle Press

I dwelt in interior darkness, when I was thirty-one. I lived inside my head without any idea of what was happening to me, fear my only companion. And then there was light. Out of nowhere, as if by magic, when I was as low as I had ever been or thought it possible to be, someone came to save me. 

This is the story of Charles ‘Chic’ Stringer, written by his widow Margaret Rose. It celebrates the career of one of the Australian film industry’s most respected stillsmen of the 1970s and ’80s, and in doing so depicts their shared journey.

3. Little Known Facts by Christine Sneed (fiction, $29.99) – courtesy of Bloomsbury Circus

Life as one of Hollywood’s most handsome, charismatic and critically-acclaimed movie stars seems like a glitzy fairytale to the people who orbit around Renn Ivins. But for his grown children, Anna and Will, their father’s fame threatens to permeate every aspect of their lives. For Anna – a diligent medical student with a promising future ahead of her but not so promising romantic prospects – the exploits of her celebrity father are a source of embarrassment and, at best, bemusement. Her brother Will, on the other hand, is floundering in a quarter-life crisis. The only thing to outlast his directionless career and failed relationships is his trust fund, but while he and Anna may be happy to use their father’s money, they’re less happy to use his influence. As the family, lovers and hangers-on of Renn Ivins struggle to forge their identities in the colossal shadow of his celebrity, Christine Sneed deftly unravels the secrets they tell each other and themselves. Little Known Facts is a multi-layered, deftly observed novel of the fallout of fame and fortune.

Which one appeals to you the most?