The Double Comfort Safari Club
Alexander McCall Smith

For the millions of The No. 1 Ladies’ Detective Agency series fans, this is the delightful new instalment in Alexander McCall Smith's beloved and bestselling series.

A master of the simple, sweet description of everyday pleasure, McCall Smith delivers another delicious addition to the much-loved series. With a tv programme set to screen shortly and a cookbook available now, the time is ripe to fall in love all over again with the fabulous Mma Ramotswe.

The Long Song
Andrea Levy

From Andrea Levy, author of Small Island and winner of the Orange Prize for Fiction, the Whitbread Book of the Year Award and the Commonwealth Writers' Prize, you’d expect something pretty good.  And it is!

This is a book that will transport and engross you.  The story, told in the irresistibe and intimate voice of Miss July (with some help from her son, Thomas), is at once funny, defiant and shocking!

"...extraordinarily reminiscent of an Austen novel in its shrewd reckoning of human nature".  The Sydney Morning Herald.

Committed

At the end of her bestselling memoir Eat, Pray, Love, Elizabeth Gilbert fell in love with Felipe.  Resettling in America, the couple swore never, ever, under any circumstances get legally married. But providence intervened…

Committed is a witty and intelligent handbook for any thinking person hovering on the verge of marriage.  It is also a clear-eyed celebration of love, with all the complexity and consequence that real love actually entails.

The Man from Beijing
One cold January day the police are called to a sleepy little hamlet in the north of Sweden where they discover a dead man lying in the snow. As they begin their investigation they notice that the village seems eerily quiet and deserted. Going from house to house, looking for witnesses, they uncover a crime unprecedented in Swedish history.

When Judge Birgitta Roslin reads about the massacre, she realises that she has a family connection to one of the couples involved and decides to investigate. What Birgitta eventually uncovers leads her into an international web of corruption and a story of vengeance that stretches back over a hundred years, linking China and the USA of the 1860s with modern-day Beijing, Zimbabwe and Mozambique, and coming to a shocking climax in London’s Chinatown.

Written by Henning Mankell, author of the Wallander series, The Man from Beijing is both a gripping and perceptive political thriller and a compelling detective story. 

Lord Sunday
Lord Sunday, Master of the Incomparable Gardens, is a fierce opponent.  And Arthur is running out of time.

He must be quick if he is to stem the tide of Nothing and save the House and the Secondary Realms. Will he ever get home to his family? Does he have a home and family left? Is he even really human anymore?

And perhaps most urgent of all:  What will be revealed when the Will of the Architect is finally made whole?

Lord Sunday is the stunning conclusion to the blockbuster Keys to the Kingdom series by Garth Nix.

"Cloudstreet", by Tim Winton, has been voted the Favourite Australian Novel in a poll by the Australian Book Review. 

"Cloudstreet ", which won the 1992 Miles Franklin Award, holds a unique place in the affections of our bookshops and readers.  "Breath", another Tim Winton favourite, came in at Number 4 on the poll behind "The Fortunes of Richard Mahoney" (Henry Handel Richardson) and "Voss" (Patrick White).

Patrick Ness has won the 2009 Costa Children's Award for The Ask and the Answer (Chaos Walking, Book Two).

Judges were "gripped by this dazzlingly-imagined, morally complex, compulsively-plotted tale."  They hailed this book as "a major achievement in the making".

Patrick Ness is the literary critic for the Guardian and has written two other books for adults.

In a surprise win poet Christopher Reid has beaten frontrunner Colm Tobin to the top prize as winner of the Costa Book of the Year. His winning collection, A Scattering, was written in memory of his late wife and was hailed by the judges as a "master work".The judges liked it so much that they awarded him the prestigious 30,000-pound prize.

The win is said to have come as something of a shock to the literary world and, likely, as a blow to Toibin, who had been firm favourite to scoop the prize for his novel Brooklyn.

Irish novelist Josephine Hart, who chaired the judging panel, hailed Reid’s collection as she announced it had won. "We feel that what Christopher Reid did was to take a personal tragedy and to make the emotion and the situation universal," she said. "We regard this work as austere and beautiful and moving."

Sixty-year-old Reid, who has held the post of professor of creative writing at Britain's University of Hull, was nominated for two Costa awards previously and this was his third time on the shortlist.

The Costa Book of the Year award is selected from five previously announced winners of individual categories, which are novel, biography, poetry, first novel and children's. The Costa Book Awards, formerly the Whitbread Book Award, was established in 1971 to celebrate contemporary British and Irish writing. A panel of writers, actors and broadcasters choose the most enjoyable books from the past year.

Read a Guardian interview with Christopher Reid to hear his reaction to the win.

Visit the official awards website here.

The US children’s author Rebecca Stead has won the coveted Newbery medal with her second novel When You Reach Me. Stead's intricate, time-travelling narrative is set in the 1970s in New York and follows the adventures of a sixth grader named Miranda. The New York Times called it a "taut novel," in which "every word, every sentence, has meaning and substance."  It also received a starred review in US industry magazine Publisher’s Weekly, who praised the “provocative questions (the story) raises.” 

The Newbery medal was established in America in 1922 and is now the longest running children’s book prize in the world.  It is selected by children's librarians and is awarded for the 'most outstanding contribution to children's literature’.

When You Reach Me will be in store on February 1st.

What a fitting tribute to a collection of Australian's finest men and women of letters - Australia Post has issued a new collection of stamps in their honour. Australia Post says this Australian Legends Award recognises six significant living novelists, each of whom has made an outstanding contribution to the social and cultural life of this country.

The award celebrates the breadth of Australian fiction writing, with the recipients representing literary and popular fiction in various genres. Together they have earned critical acclaim and literary prizes, loyal readerships and immense sales.

This means that you can affix images of Peter Carey, Bryce Courtenay, Thomas Keneally, David Malouf, Colleen McCullough or Tim Winton to the missives you transport across the country.

Order your first day issue stamps direct from Australia Post here.

Thomas Kenneally will tell you that he's glad to see the stamps are self-adhesive. Find out why at the Sydney Morning Herald.

Word is that a slew of accounts of the life of Swedish crime writer Stieg Larsson are lined up for publication this year. Larsson, author of the bestselling Millennium trilogy, died at the age of 50 in 2004 before any of his novels were published. They have since become an international sensation, having sold millions of copies worldwide.

Now word on publication dates yet but, writer and reviewer Barry Forshaw will be bringing us The Man Who Left Too Soon. Kurdo Baksi will publish My Friend Stieg, again translated from Swedish. Baksi was a very close friend of Larsson who worked with him on setting up the anti-Nazi foundation Expo. There is also speculation that Larsson's partner Eva Gabrielsson, who is involved in a high-profile dispute with Larsson's relatives over the proceeds from the books, is preparing her own account of her life with the writer.

Forshaw said his book will be "even-handed" in covering the dispute. "It's so incendiary. This is the first major biography so I can't take sides. But I've set out what each side says." The Man Who Left too Soon will examine why the books became the phenomenon they now are, says Forshaw. "If Larsson were still writing, the legend wouldn't be there. His success is down to a totally original female character and the premature death of the author. It would be naive not to say that." But the book will be "by no means a hagiography", he adds. "Larsson's a wonderful storyteller who creates this new kind of heroine in Lisbeth Salander, but there are flaws in the books. And Larsson was a brave man, but also a strange mixture."

Source - The Bookseller (UK)

Nominees for the 2010 Edgar Award have been announced and Australia’s very own Malla Nunn is among the short list in the Best Novel category for her bestselling debut novel, A Beautiful Place to Die.

Starring charismatic detective Emmanuel Cooper and set in South Africa, A beautiful Place to Die is a thrilling, action-packed story with a thoughtful, complex portrayal of an unforgettable time and place and the human desires that drive us all, regardless of race, colour or creed.

The other nominees include some of our other favourites including: The Missing by Tim Gautreaux; The Odds by Kathleen George; The Last Child by John Hart; Nemesis by Jo Nesbø, translated by Don Bartlett and the fantastic Mystic Arts of Erasing All Signs of Death by Charlie Huston. Also nominated was Attica Locke’s Black Water Rising for Best First Novel by an American Author.

Winners will be announced on the 29th April, 2010 in New York.

Want to hear a sample of what’s in the brand new 39 Clues book that comes out in February? Listen to the author read an extract that you’ll only find here. The new book is book 7 in a series that has become a break out phenomenon and a New York Times bestseller. There is also a brand new card pack available in February – new secrets, new clues and the hidden locations of a whole other batch of clues!

And what happens in book 7? Read on…

The most dangerous secret in Amy and Dan’s past is unveiled. It’s no longer a game. The body count is rising. Shaken by recent events, Amy and Dan flee to an exotic land and trace the footsteps of their most formidable ancestor yet: a military leader of mythic proportions. Yet just as the siblings begin to master the art of ancient warfare, they confront a dangerous enemy that can’t be felled with a sword: the truth. With the stakes higher than ever, Amy and Dan uncover a devastating secret that changes everything.

Watch a video recording of the author, Peter Legrandis, reading an exclusive extract from the new book here. This reading has been prepared especially for Australian independent bookshops who are members of the Leading Edge Books group.

The brilliant mind and quirky humour that brought us the irresistible Thursday Next and the series that began with the brilliant The Eyre Affair, is back with a whole new tale of dazzling ingenuity.

No one can cheat the Colourman and the colour test. What you get is what you are, forever. A Red? A Green? Your fate is laid out before you. Your life, career and social standing are decided right there and then, and all worrisome life-uncertainties eradicated forever. You know who you are, what you will do, where you will go, and what is expected of you. In return, you must simply accept your rung upon the Chromatic ladder, and stick by the Rulebook. Your life is mapped. And all in the time it takes to bake a tray of scones…

Eddie Russett lives comfortably in a world where fortune, career and ultimate destiny are rigidly dictated by the colours you can see. Until he falls in love with a Grey named Jane, and starts to question every aspect of the Rulebook. Why are spoons illegal? And what actually happens to all those people who are sent to the Emerald City to Reboot?

See the official book trailer here.

Scottish crime diva, Val McDermid, has been named as the recipient of this year's prestigious CWA Cartier Diamond Dagger Award. Charmingly she says she's "a bit gobsmacked" by the award, which honours outstanding achievement in the field of crime writing.

The announcement has been made by the UK Crime Writers' Association (CWA) in recognition of Val's work over more than 20 years. McDermid is best known for her Tony Hill books, which became a tv series.

Read the full article at the Guardian here.

The Rudd family have been busy writing, but Prime Minister Kevin Rudd is going to beat his daughter into print. Due to be published right on time for Australia Day is Jasper and Abby and the Great Australia Day Kerfuffle, a picture book about the Rudd family's pets. It's been co-written with Play School host Rhys Muldoon and illustrated by Carla Zapel. All royalties from the sale of the book will go to the Centre for Community Child Health at the Royal Children's Hospital in Melbourne.

Is it true this is the first book to be written via Blackberry? Find out at The Australian website.

Jessica Rudd's first novel will be released later in the year. If she enjoys anything like the success achieved by Ireland's Celia Ahern - yes, daughter of Bertie - she'll be doing very well indeed.

Voting for the annual Macquarie Dictionary Word of the Year poll has opened. Among the book-related new words to be nominated this year are ‘heist novel'--‘a novel in which the plot hinges on the planning and execution of an ambitious and complicated robbery, usually with the scheme, initially successful, going awry' and ‘book trailer' (many examples of which you can see in our newsletters).

See the nominated words and vote for your favourite.

Votes will determine the People's Choice Word of the Year from the new words that will be included in the updated online dictionary. The overall winning word will be selected by the Word of the Year committee, chaired by University of Sydney vice-chancellor Michael Spence. The winner will be announced on 3 February.

A new year brings with it the promise of a whole calendar of delicious new books. And of course one of the biggest games in town is to pick the ones that are going to be the big hits and the big discoveries of the next twelve months.

Check out this list from The Guardian in the UK. Publication dates vary, in many cases, from Australian publication dates (The Museum of Innocence and The Cello Suites have already been published here, for example, and have already proven a hit with Australian readers for Christmas 2009). Even so - it's definitely worth a skim to see what the UK pundits are picking as the big hits for the months ahead.

Read the opening pages from The Cello Suites here.

For generations Where’s Wally? has fascinated and entertained children worldwide and the Wally series has hit a major milestone this week with the incredible news that the 50 millionth copy has now been sold!

Since first publication in 1987, Where’s Wally? has become an international phenomenon, with the books being sold in over 30 countries and 25 languages, including Egyptian, Korean and Hebrew.

Such is Wally’s celebrity status that he has appeared in the primetime American TV shows Frasier, The Simpsons and Friends, as well as on the 1000th anniversary cover of Rolling Stone magazine, where he appeared as a cultural icon of the last 40 years.

Loved by the young and those not-so-young - the search for Wally never grows old!

Two Indies favourites - Colm Toibin and Patrick Ness - have won their individual categories in the Costa Awards. Irish author Colm Toibin beat Man Booker Prize winner Hilary Mantel in the novel category for Brooklyn which centres on a young Irish girl who travels to the United States in the 1950s to find work before tragic news summons her back home.

Toibin is now favourite for winning the overall Costa Book of the Year Award which is chosen from the winners of the five categories.

Patrick Ness won the children's book award for The Ask and the Answer, the second instalment in the Chaos Walking trilogy, which judges hailed as a "dazzlingly-imagined, morally complex, compulsively-plotted tale".

The Costa Book Award, formerly the Whitbread Book Award, was established in 1971 to celebrate contemporary British and Irish writing. A panel of writers, actors and broadcasters choose the most enjoyable books from the past year.

The overall prize will be announced on Tuesday 26th January 2010 in London. Stay tuned to Indies.com.au to find out who the winner is!

The buzz is building about two huge books hitting the shops to start the New Year with a bang – Elizabeth Gilbert’s Committed and Elizabeth Kostova’s The Swan Thieves.

Committed is the eagerly awaited sequel to the international mega-hit, Eat, Pray, Love. At the end of her bestselling memoir Elizabeth Gilbert fell in love with Felipe – a Brazilian-born man who'd been living in Indonesia when they met. Resettling in America, the couple swore to never, ever, under any circumstances get legally married. But providence intervened one day in the form of a border guard and the U.S. government, who gave the couple a choice: they could either get married, or Felipe would never be allowed to enter the country again…

Elizabeth’s Kostova’s The Historian was a breakout betseller. Now she follows up with The Swan Thieves, sure to be just as gripping.

Psychiatrist Andrew Marlowe has a perfectly ordered life – solitary, perhaps, but full of devotion to his profession and the painting hobby he loves. This order is destroyed when renowned painter Robert Oliver attacks a canvas in the National Gallery of Art and becomes his patient. Desperate to understand the secret that torments this genius, Marlowe embarks on a journey that leads him into the lives of the women closest to Oliver and a tragedy at the heart of French Impressionism. Kostova's carries us from American cities to the coast of Normandy; from the late nineteenth century to the late twentieth, from young love to last love. The Swan Thieves is a story of obsession, history's losses, and the power of art.

Two books that are sure to please. Enjoy!

It’s the Christmas holidays and the movie season has begun with two fantastic and much-loved books hitting the screen this week.

Just a year after the astonishing film release of No Country for Old Men (winner of four academy awards) we’re about to be bowled over again by the latest Cormac McCarthy novel to move from the page to the big screen, The Road. With an all-star cast including Viggo Mortensen, Charlize Theron, Guy Pearce, Robert Duvall and introducing major new young talent, Kodi Smit McPhee, with a soundtrack by Nick Cave and Warren Ellis. This is definitely not to be missed.

Winner of The Pulitzer Prize for fiction in 2007, The Road is the story of a father and son walking alone through burned America, struggling through the ravaged landscape towards the coast. And it’s good.

Here’s another outstanding book that is about to become a box-office sensation, thanks to director Peter Jackson and actors Susan Sarandon, Rachel Weisz, Mark Wahlburg and newcomer Saoirse Ronan. First published in 2002 The Lovely Bones became a word-of-mouth bestseller, one of those books that everyone was talking about, everyone was rocked by, and everyone was loving.

Watching from her place in heaven, Susie Salmon sees her suburban family devastated by her death, isolated from one another as they each try to cope with their terrible loss alone. Over the years, her friends and siblings grow up, fall in love, and do all the things she never had the chance to do herself. But life is not quite finished with Susie…

So these holidays - read the book, see the film and prepare to be blown away.

May your summer be filled with books that thrill and delight

Seasons greetings and Happy Holidays

Hilary Mantel’s Wolf Hall is now officially the most popular Man Booker winner since records began, according to UK reports and independent bookshops have been the driving force behind the strong record sales.

Probably one of the most prestigious and highly recognised literary prizes in the English-speaking world, the Man Booker is presented to one outstanding work of fiction from authors in Britain or the Commonwealth.

Each year sales of the winner grow from strength to strength because Australian’s love to read Man Booker Winners! Wolf Hall continues to follow the trend and has been sitting at the top of our bestseller list since the announcement.

Last years winner, Aravind Adiga’s The White Tiger was another popular choice with readers and hit the bestseller lists soon after being announced.

Win a beautiful print from Return to the Hundred Acre Wood featuring all your favourite characters playing cricket in the sun! What could be more representative of the perfect Australian summer?

David Benedictus and Mark Burgess have taken us back to the world of Pooh, Piglet, Tigger and Eyore, eighty years since A A Milne first enchanted us with the books that have become classics. Return to the Hundred Acre Wood is a new treasure, which brings this timeless series to life all over again.

When you purchase a copy of Return to the Hundred Acre Wood at your favourite indie bookshop you could win one of ten prints from the book’s illustrator, Mark Burgess.

Click here to go to our competitions page for details and conditions.

For all Pooh Bear fans here’s a great school holiday activity. Click on one of our links below to download a colouring page featuring your favourite characters from the Hundred Acre Wood.

The House at Pooh Corner

Now We Are Six

Winnie the Pooh

When We Were Very Young

Our Summer Reading Guide is out now at participating indie bookshops (all members of Leading Edge Books) and you could win a collection of books worth over $4,000. This magnificent prize of 100 books includes a fantastic mixture of new and classic fiction and non-fiction for the whole family.

To enter, simply pick up a copy of the Summer Reading Guide and enter the competition at your favourite participating indie. Simply complete the entry form on the inside cover of the catalogue, tell us in 25 words or less why you love shopping at your local independent bookstore and drop it into the in-store collection box.

Thanks for shopping at your independent bookstore!

Hunger Games fans take note – the third and final book in Suzanne Collins’s fantasy trilogy will be released on August 24, 2010. The title for book three will be announced early next year.

Suzanne Collins loves to leave her novels mid-storyline so news that readers of the bestselling series have only eight months to wait until finding out the fate of Katniss Everdeen and Peeta Mellark is very exciting.

The Hunger Games are a futuristic nation-wide reality TV show where children are pitted against each other in a struggle to the death. Katniss and fellow tribute Peeta have won the Hunger Games securing safety and wealth for their families and unintenionally started a rebellion with far-reaching consequences.

Let the countdown begin!

To read a Q and A session with Suzanne Collins click here.

The 2009 Nobel Prize for Literature has been announced. And the prize goes to Romanian-born German writer Herta Müller. The Svenska Akademien hailed her as  "[she], who, with the concentration of poetry and the frankness of prose, depicts the landscape of the dispossessed".

Her most recent English-language title was The Appointment (2001). Other titles - The Passport (1989) and The Land of Green Plums - are shortly to be reissued by English publishers. Müller's publisher at Serpent's Tail, Pete Ayrton says,"Herta Müller is a writer who helps us understand what it is to be human in the 20th and 21st centuries. Though rooted in the German ethnic minority of Romania, her writing is universal . . . Once again the Nobel Prize committee has done its job—to bring to the attention of a wider public an essential writer whose lyrical prose captures the oppression of totalitarian regimes."

Visit the official Nobel Prize site here to see a videocast of the announcement.