In the first of a six-part series of memoirs by Australian writers, Man Booker Prize winner Tom Keneally recalls one memorable summer spent on the NSW North Coast, dodging death and courting romance.

It is one of the mysteries of the book publishing world that the market in India is so small. Even in gross terms, let alone per capita, fewer Indians buy fiction and nonfiction than Australians, despite India's high literacy rate, strong education system, growing middle class and a 50-fold population. parallel..read more

As Christmas and the summer reading season loom we asked a group of writers from home and abroad to tell us which books had tickled their fancies over the past year.

Words have the power to make or break

MUSEUM REVIEW: TRANSPORTED BACK Public Record Office, 99 Shiel Street, North Melbourne, until March 31; SCIENCEWORKS Booker Street, Spotswood. FLASHBACK Ian Potter Centre, NGV Australia, until March 28