Bob Book Club: Spring Edition
If you are constantly resolving to read more, we think spring might just be the perfect time, and so we bring you edition two of the Bob Book Club.
In the salon, two things that – as a team – we are constantly striving to do is learn and be mindful, and reading gives us the magical ability to do both.
In this book club list, our journal editor has found something for everyone. From real, devastating and insightful stories, to the fictitious ones that scare you or make you laugh, this is our definitive list of old and new books to read this spring.
Head to your local book store (we recommend My Bookshop by Corrie Perkin in Hawksburn Village), grab a cup of tea and a blanket or a picnic rug and some snacks, and dive deep into the wonderful world of Bob’s Book Club.
Bruny by Heather Rose
In our summer/autumn edition of book club, we introduced you to Museum of Modern Love by Australian author, Heather Rose. Bruny is her much anticipated book that is set to be released in October.
How far would your government go?
A right-wing US president has withdrawn America from the Middle East and the UN. Daesh has a thoroughfare to the sea and China is Australia's newest ally. When a bomb goes off in remote Tasmania, Astrid Coleman agrees to return home to help her brother before an upcoming election. But this is no simple task. Her brother and sister are on either side of politics, the community is full of conspiracy theories, and her father is quoting Shakespeare. Only on Bruny does the world seem sane.
Until Astrid discovers how far the government is willing to go.
Bruny is a searing, subversive, brilliant novel about family, love, loyalty and the new world order.
JK Rowling's crime novels under pseudonym Robert Galbraith
The Cormoran Strike series is classic contemporary crime fiction set in London, where war veteran turned private detective, Cormoran Strike, solves brutal murders with the help of his trusted assistant Robin Ellacott.
The first Cormoran Strike novel, The Cuckoo’s Calling, was published in 2013 and since then, three more books have followed: The Silkworm (2014), Career of Evil (2015) and Lethal White (2018).
If you are fed up with the stock standard crime novel, this is one for you. The Cormoran Strike series is intelligently written, in true JK Rowling style, and is incredibly captivating.
Educated by Tara Westover
Tara Westover and her family grew up preparing for the End of Days but, according to the government, she didn’t exist. She hadn’t been registered for a birth certificate. She had no school records because she’d never set foot in a classroom, and no medical records because her father didn’t believe in hospitals.
As she grew older, her father became more radical and her brother more violent. At sixteen, Tara knew she had to leave home. In doing so she discovered both the transformative power of education, and the price she had to pay for it.
The Last Girl: My Story of Captivity and My Fight Against the Islamic State by Nadia Murad
An autobiographical novel by Nadia Murad in which she describes how she was captured and enslaved by the Islamic State during the Second Iraqi Civil War. The book eventually led to the 2018 Nobel Peace Prize being awarded to Murad, and we won’t lie; it’s pretty heavy. But, it’s a real eye opener that personally made me feel very grateful for the privilege to grow up in Australia.
The Rosie Project by Graeme Simsion
I’m late to the party on this one, but if you are too, you have to pick up this book.
It’s a hilarious, feel-good novel that is narrated by an oddly charming and socially challenged genetics professor on an unusual quest: to find out if he is capable of true love.
Don Tillman is a professor of genetics who has never been on a second date. He can count all of his friends on the fingers of one hand, and he’s convinced himself that he is simply not wired for romance. So when an acquaintance informs him that he would make a “wonderful” husband, his first reaction is shock, and then he starts The Wife Project. In the orderly, evidence-based manner with which he approaches all things, Don sets out to find the perfect partner. She will be punctual and logical—most definitely not a barmaid, a smoker, a drinker, or a late-arriver.
Yet Rosie Jarman is all these things. She is also beguiling, fiery, intelligent—and on a quest of her own. She is looking for her biological father, a search that a certain DNA expert might be able to help her with. Don's Wife Project takes a back burner to the Father Project and an unlikely relationship blooms, forcing the scientifically minded geneticist to confront the spontaneous whirlwind that is Rosie—and the realization that love is not always what looks good on paper.
The Rosie Project is a moving and hilarious novel for anyone who has ever tenaciously gone after life or love in the face of overwhelming challenges.