The 12 books of Christmas: Here’s what to read in December

By Jason Steger

December brings new books by Niki Savva, Cormac McCarthy, Geraldine Brooks, Louis Nowra, Jane Smiley and Pip Drysdale.

With just three weeks to go, here are the 12 books of Christmas.

So many books have been released in the past three months as publishers and booksellers gear up for the crucial end-of-year season, yet there are still more to hit the shelves.

Take your pick; there’s something for everyone.

The Booklist is a weekly newsletter for book lovers from books editor Jason Steger. Get it delivered every Friday.

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Bulldozed, Niki Savva

Scribe, $45, December 1

The final volume of Niki Savva’s trilogy of insightful histories of the nine years of Coalition governments, following The Road to Ruin and Plots and Prayers. In this instalment, she turns her attention to the years of Scott Morrison’s prime ministership and the rocky path to this year’s federal election, which ushered in the teal phenomenon and the Albanese government. As per usual, she talks to everyone who matters – except the former PM, who declined the opportunity.

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Stella Maris, Cormac McCarthy

Picador, $34.99, December 13

This is the companion to The Passenger, which came out in October. Whatever you thought of it – plenty of people were underwhelmed – you’ll want to read this shorter book, which brings to life Alicia Western. It is essentially a conversation between Alicia, schizophrenic and prone to hallucinations and suicide attempts, and her doctor. “Side by side,” our review says, “both novels affirm the extraordinary poetry and strangeness of McCarthy’s vision.”

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On Tim Winton, Geraldine Brooks

Black Inc, $17.99, November 29

There have been some gems in the Writers on Writers series and in this distinctly personal, yet perceptive look at the work of the great West Australian novelist from the Pulitzer winner. Her approach to criticism is “what is this novel doing, and how well is it doing it?” Winton has described himself as working like a tradie in his writing career. Brooks takes that further, pointing out that he has utterly mastered a craft – its details, skills, gear and tackle and trim.

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Sydney: A Biography, Louis Nowra

NewSouth, $39.99, December 1

This is playwright Louis Nowra’s third book about Sydney, following on from his more focused studies, Kings Cross and Woolloomooloo. As our reviewer says: “By drawing on many individual versions of Sydney, and the connections between people and place across its history, Nowra presents a rich and reflective urban portrait … Nowra’s biographical approach captures the city’s story as an evolving, living narrative.”

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Shmutz, Felicia Berliner

Allen & Unwin, $32.99, November 29

Raiz is a young Hasidic woman expecting an eventual arranged marriage to a suitable boy. But she has a secret addiction – internet porn – and thinks that might turn into an obstacle along the way. Our reviewer describes Felicia Berliner’s first novel as “a brilliant, big-hearted comic erotic novel that brings a transgressive eye to the tensions between between sex and spirituality, modernity and tradition.” And Berliner has said she wrote the book as a protest against the requirement to choose and fit in.

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Minds Went Walking, Various

Fremantle Press, $32.99, December 1

If Paul Kelly’s How to Make Gravy has become some sort of national Christmas song, this book is the perfect seasonal gift for a Kelly fan. Under the stewardship of Mark Smith, Jock Serong, and Neil A White a group of writers including Robbie Arnott, Alice Bishop, Laura Elvery, Claire G. Coleman, Tim Rogers, Bram Presser and Mirandi Riwoe rootle through Kelly’s musical catalogue and create stories that bounce off the master lyricist’s own yarns.

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Shirley Hazzard, Brigitta Olubas

Virago, $34.99, December 1

I’ve been looking forward to this life of the great novelist, short-story writer and prose stylist. Her first story was published by The New Yorker after fiction editor William Maxwell picked it from the slush pile. And he was the one who told her she would eventually write novels – despite her devotion to the shorter form. He was, of course, right. There were only four, but they included The Great Fire, for which she won the Miles Franklin, and the magnificent Transit of Venus. Read about the life – mostly lived in New York – and then return to the work.

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Monumental Lies: Culture Wars and the Truth About the Past, Robert Bevan

Verso, $39.99, November 29

In this timely book, Robert Bevan examines the way we deal with the physical fabric of cities such as monuments and statues in our post-Black Lives Matter world. Should we rip down those memorials to people now on the nose or should they be displayed in a more appropriate way. It’s a book that is worried about the loss of what Bevan calls the material evidence of history that he finds in cities. It’s an area that is a minefield and this will set you thinking.

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Jan Morris, Paul Clements

Scribe, $55, November 29

Jan Morris was undoubtedly a prolific writer, known for her histories and her travel books. But her life was equally fascinating. The first of her books that I read was Conundrum back in the late 1970s, which described her gender transition and remains a fascinating memoir. As a journalist with The Times, she notably covered the first ascension of Everest and the trial of Adolf Eichmann. She was a wonderful figure, a marvellous writer and a trailblazer.

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The Young Menzies, Zachary Gorman (ed)

Melbourne University Press, $49.99, November 29

The first of a four-volume history of Robert Menzies, founder of the Liberal party and Australia’s longest-serving PM, and his world. According to Geoffrey Blainey, “it is only now that historians are seriously estimating the extent of his influennce”. Zachary Gorman, academic coordinator at the Menzies Insitute, has commissioned essays from the likes of Troy Bramston, Judith Brett, Frank Bongiorno and Anne Henderson about Menzies’ ups and down from 1894 to 1942.

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A Dangerous Business, Jane Smiley

Abacus, $32.99, December 13

The Pulitzer Prize-winning novelist has turned to historical crime in her 16th novel for adults. In A Dangerous Business, battered widow Eliza turns to prostitution in order to survive in California during the mid-19th-century gold rush. Someone is killing her fellow sex workers at the brothel where she is employed and, with the help of a friend, Eliza is determined to find out who. And the dangerous business? Not just sex work, but simply being a woman.

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The Next Girl, Pip Drysdale

Simon & Schuster, $32.99, November 30

This has all the hallmarks of a book that will keep you up at night – even when you want to go to sleep. A young woman wakes up in a strange man’s bed and doesn’t know quite how she got there. Of course, there’s a story behind it – more than one, as it turns out – and it involves Billie being sacked from a law firm after it loses a case against a predatory doctor. How can she stop him? The title gives you a clue.

The Booklist is a weekly newsletter for book lovers from books editor Jason Steger. Get it delivered every Friday.

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