The Bookshelf
The Bookshelf
ABC Australia
Chris Hammer, Jem Calder and Pip Williams reviewed on this week's Bookshelf
54 minutes Posted Oct 9, 2026 at 4:00 am.
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Show notes
Kate and Cassie are joined by rockstar Tim Rogers and novelist Madeleine Gray to discuss some big new releases.
Australian crime heavyweight Chris Hammer swaps the outback for the world of high finance in Full Circle, a thriller of money, power and corruption. Then there's Jem Calder's I Want You to Be Happy, a zeitgeisty portrait of young Londoners searching for connection in an increasingly disconnected world; and Pip Williams' The German Wife, her eagerly anticipated follow-up to The Dictionary of Lost Words and The Bookbinder of Jericho, a sweeping World War I story of forbidden love and art.
Plus, as Radio National's Top 100 Australian Books countdown draws closer, novelist, essayist and art critic Fiona Kelly McGregor discusses three Australian books that have had an impact on her life and writing. 
FEATURED BOOKS
Full Circle by Chris Hammer, Summit Books
I Want You to be Happy by Jem Calder, Faber
The German Ward by Pip Williams,  Affirm Press 
FIONA KELLY MCGREGOR'S TOP 3 AUSTRALIAN BOOKS
Working Hot by Mary Fallon
The Other Side of the Frontier: Aboriginal Resistance to the European Invasion of Australia by Henry Reynolds
Voss by Patrick White
OTHER BOOKS MENTIONED
Famesick by Lena Dunham
The Book of George by Kate Greathead
Rejection by Tony Tulathimutte
Lean Cat, Savage Cat by Lauren J. Joseph
Detransition, Baby by Torrey Peters
Happy Hour by Marlowe Granados
Johnno by David Malouf
Night Boat to Tangier, Beatlebone by Kevin Barry
A Suitable Man by Jock Serong