The Booktopia Book Guru, John Purcell, answers Ten Terrifying Questions from The Booktopia Book Guru, John Purcell. Read more

Guest post by Kylie Ladd, author of The Way Back. Read more

This September we’re launching Operation GMR, Get Men Reading. We constantly get asked what books we’d recommend for husbands, sons, fathers, uncles, nephews etc. And we often answer ANYTHING because we think men simply don’t read enough (myself included). So we’ve asked some of Australia’s favourite authors to recommend five books that every man should read. Today... Read more

I have been selling books for 20 years and something I get asked more often than anything else is – can you suggest a book which will get my son reading? You can exchange son with husband, boyfriend, brother, father, uncle… The question usually comes from a big reader, male or female, who just wants someone they love to enjoy the wonders of reading too. I’m sure there are many... Read more

One of Booktopia’s favourite authors, Kylie Ladd, has proven to be a deft hand at exploring uncomfortable terrain. Her wonderful upcoming novel Into My Arms is no exception. In keeping with the theme of challenging yet brilliant reads, (and on the birthday of Vladimir Nabokov, author of Lolita) Kylie was kind enough to share her five favourite books that make us explore the darker corners... Read more

I interview writers every week here on the Booktopia Blog. My Ten Terrifying Questions have been answered by over 250 published authors ranging from mega selling global stars like Jackie Collins and Lee Child to brilliant, relatively unknown debut authors such as Favel Parret and  Rebecca James. In each of these interviews I ask the following question: Q. What advice do you give aspiring writer... Read more

Kylie Ladd author of Last Summer and After the Fall reveals… The 5 best novels I read this year are… Caribou Island by David Vann An Alaskan Revolutionary Road, Caribou Island from David Vann, bestselling and critically acclaimed author of Legend of a Suicide, is a devastating novel about a marriage, a couple blighted by past shadows and the weight of expectation, of themselves and of each othe... Read more

This year I read more novels by living, breathing writers than by stone cold dead writers. This is a first for me. However, if the truth be told, many of the contemporary novels I started were left unfinished. It’s partly due to the nature of the job. Publishers throw box loads of fiction at us to review and I can’t read them all. And, it is partly due to the state of modern fiction... Read more

My nine year old daughter spotted You Deserve Nothing on my bedside table and was immediately incensed by the title. “Who deserves nothing?” she demanded. “Why do they deserve nothing? That’s SO mean! Everyone deserves something.” While I thoroughly enjoyed Alexander Maksik’s debut novel, I must admit that as I read the book I pondered over the title too. Who was the ‘you’ at its centre? Will S... Read more