Dervla McTiernan The Unquiet Grave Book 4 of The Cormac Reilly Series HarperCollins Publishers Australia | HarperCollins AU, April 2025.

Thank you, NetGalley, for providing me with this uncorrected proof for review.

Dervla McTiernan returns to Ireland and Cormac Reilly, creating a deftly woven seemingly multitude of ideas, crimes, and personal relationships in The Unquiet Grave. The book revisits Cormac’s commitment to integrity in the police force, where it has impacted his past and looms in his present relationships with his co-workers and future. A bizarre murder is unearthed by a German family visiting a remote bog surrounded cottage in Ireland, and although they appear for only a short time, they establish a feeling of unease as the father’s approach to the finding betrays his desire to impart knowledge unhindered by his wife and daughter’s opinions. This unease is reflected in various relationships as the case, and the causes of additional murders, develop. See Books: Reviews for the complete review.

Cristina Wolf How To Write A Rom-Com Aria and Aries |Aria, May 2025.

Thank you, Net Galley, for providing me with this uncorrected proof for review.

I was disappointed in this novel, as I came to it expecting to find something more than a romance. The idea at the heart of the novel, showing how writing a romance works is smart. However, the story never goes beyond this simple aspiration. Depicting engaging characters who struggle against the platitudes of the genre, raising some comic plot devices to undermine the genre, while eventually having to succumb – after all, who wants to really deprive the world of romance and its authors – would have been such a clever move. Cristina Wolf does not take this option. See Books: Reviews for the complete review.

The Washington Post

Jane Gardam, British novelist with a mordant wit, dies at 96

Story by Harrison Smith

Jane Gardam, whose witty and perceptive novels explored the pangs of young love, the disappointments of old age and the twilight of the British Empire, died April 28 in Chipping Norton, in the Cotswolds region of England. She was 96.

A spokeswoman for her publisher, Little, Brown Book Group, confirmed the death but did not cite a cause.

Ms. Gardam started writing relatively late, raising three young children before publishing her first book at 43. She went on to produce more than two dozen novels, story collections and children’s books, gaining a following for work that was often darkly comic, satirizing status-conscious aristocrats and the upper-middle classes while grappling with the legacies of British imperialism and World War II.

“As the best artists do, she offers hard truths in a pleasurable way,” novelist Susan Minot wrote in a 2022 essay for the Paris Review. “There is no overindulgence. Sensuous details are side by side with a sharp intelligence. … Philosophical musings merge into social commentary, but you notice no intrusion because you are mesmerized by the story. The story is everything.”

Ms. Gardam won the Whitbread prize, one of Britain’s most prestigious literary awards, for her children’s book “The Hollow Land” (1982) and her epistolary novel “The Queen of the Tambourine” (1991), which traced an unhappily married woman’s descent into madness.

Jane Gardam’s novels, and short stories, have been a pleasurable part of my life for years. Her short stories are everything a short story should be – I am not a lover of short stories usually, but Jane Gardam’s are such a good read.

Australian Federal Election

In Western Australia, author Gordon D’Venables, *left his writing to hand out how to vote cards in the seat of Bunbury. He did not leave his sense of humour at his writing desk, sending me a photo of the Independent candidate’s poster (the Liberal candidate’s name is Small).

*The Medusa Image and Hunted.

After handing out How to Vote cards in Downer, we kept up with the news watching the results come in our comfortable home with friends – and lots of food. After a couple of hours at the polling station this was a great end to the day. Although the Polling Place was relatively quiet, the familiar democracy sausage, lots of dogs, and supporting the Labor candidate was as usual.

Sydney Morning Herald

PM Anthony Albanese wins an historic second term. He is the first leader since John Howard to lead their party to two election victories.

“This is a time of profound opportunity for our nation…We have everything we need to seize this moment and make it our own, but we must do it together.” PM Anthony Albanese.

Anthony Green the ABC analyst leaves, another historic moment.

Some American reflections on the result

CNN World

After Canada, Australia swings left

The candidates’ ability to deal with the US president had been a talking point of the campaign. Despite criticism that he had been unable to get Trump on the phone, Albanese said they had shared “warm” conversations in the past and he saw no reason not to trust him. Canberra remains a staunch ally of Washington, despite Trump’s tariffs threat.

Dutton entered the five-week campaign on a strong footing. But analysts say his chances were badly damaged by policy misses and reversals, and weighed down by Trump’s wrecking-ball approach to the global order.

By contrast, Albanese’s Labor Party was able to demonstrate a steady hand – striking an authoritative tone in response to Trump’s decision to impose 10% tariffs on Australia, which were later paused, analysts said.

Labor handed a strong mandate

In the last three years, Albanese has been credited with improving relations with China, leading to the lifting of tariffs imposed during his predecessor’s term. His government has also repaired relations with Pacific island nations, in part to prevent Beijing from filling a leadership vacuum. On foreign relations, he’s promised more of the same.

Within Australia, Albanese’s government has been widely criticized for not being aggressive enough in efforts to tame rising living costs during a period of high global inflation. In the years ahead, he’s promised a tax cut, cheaper medicines, lower deposits for first-time buyers and 1.2 million houses to ease the housing crisis. See Further Commentary and Articles arising from Books* and continued longer articles as noted in the blog. for the complete article.

Australia’s center-left Labor Party retains power in vote seen as test of anti-Trump sentiment

Hilary Whiteman, CNN and Angus Watson, CNN, 00:32Brisbane and Sydney, Australia CNN — 

Australia’s Prime Minister Anthony Albanese has secured a second term in office in a disastrous night for his conservative rivals, as voters chose stability over change against a backdrop of global turmoil inflicted by US President Donald Trump.

Australia’s return of a left-leaning government follows Canada’s similar sharp swing towards Mark Carney’s Liberal Party, another governing party whose fortunes were transformed by Trump. The loss of Liberal Party leader Peter Dutton’s seat mirrors that of Conservative Party leader Pierre Poilievre.

While Australia wasn’t facing the same threats to its sovereignty as Canada, Trump’s global tariffs and policy swings have undermined Australians’ trust in the US, according to recent surveys.

Albanese’s victory makes him the first Australian prime minister to win re-election for two decades and he will start his second term with at least 87 seats in the 150-seat lower house, according to the most recent estimates.

A clearly emotional Albanese took the stage to cheers just before 10 p.m. local time to thank Australians for choosing a majority Labor government, defying predictions both major parties would lose seats.

“In this time of global uncertainty, Australians have chosen optimism and determination,” Albanese said, at the Labor victory party in Sydney.

Dutton, who had hoped to end the night as prime minister, lost the outer-suburban Brisbane seat that he’s held for more than 20 years, ending a brutal night for the veteran politician who held senior seats in the last Coalition government.

In conceding defeat, Dutton said he accepted full responsibility for the election loss.

“Our Liberal family is hurting across the country tonight,” Dutton said. “We’ve been defined by our opponents in this election, which is not the true story of who we are, but we’ll rebuild from here.”

World powers have been congratulating Albanese. US Secretary of State Marco Rubio called Australia a “valued ally” while UK Prime Minister Keir Starmer said “long-distance friendships can be the strongest.” See Further Commentary and Articles arising from Books* and continued longer articles as noted in the blog. for the complete article.

Some Australian reflections on the result

Multiple factors played into this debacle for the Coalition, here’s where it went wrong.

The Conversation

In a dramatic parallel, what happened in Canada at the beginning of this week has now been replicated in Australia at the end of the week.

An opposition that a few months ago had looked just possibly on track to dislodge the government, or at least run it close, has bombed spectacularly.

Opposition Leader Peter Dutton has lost his Queensland seat of Dickson, as did the Conservative leader Pierre Poilievre in Canada.

Far from being forced into minority government, as most observers had been expecting, Labor has increased its majority with a substantial swing towards it.

Its strong victory reflects not just the the voters’ judgement that the Coalition was not ready to govern. It was worse than that. People just didn’t rate the Coalition or its offerings.

Multiple factors played into this debacle for the Coalition.

A first-term government historically gets a chance of a second term.

The Trump factor overshadowed this election. It made people feel it was best to stick with the status quo. People also were very suspicious of Dutton, whom they saw (despite disclaimers) as being too like the hardline US president.

After the last election, Dutton was declared by many to be unelectable, and that proved absolutely to be the case, despite what turned out to be a misleading impression when the polls were so bad for Labor.

Even if they’d had a very good campaign, the Coalition would probably not have had a serious chance of winning this election.

But its campaign was woeful. The nuclear policy was a drag and a distraction. Holding back policy until late was a bad call. When the policies came, they were often thin and badly prepared. The ambitious defence policy had no detail. The gas reservation scheme had belated modelling.

The forced backflip on working from home, and the late decision to offer a tax offset, were other examples of disaster in the campaign.

Dutton must wear the main share of the blame. He kept strategy and tactics close to his chest.

But the performance of the opposition frontbench, with a few exceptions, has been woeful.

Shadow Treasurer Angus Taylor and finance spokeswoman Jane Hume have been no match for their Labor counterparts Jim Chalmers and Katy Gallagher.

Albanese and Labor ran a very disciplined campaign. Albanese himself performed much better than he did in 2022. See Further Commentary and Articles arising from Books* and continued longer articles as noted in the blog. for the complete article.

Inside Story

How Peter Dutton misread the electorate

A misconceived election strategy’s long history

Karen Middleton 2 May 2025 

If there was a moment that set the course for the 2025 electoral contest, it was the Liberals’ defeat in the Aston by-election on April Fool’s Day 2023. When his party became the first opposition in a century to lose a seat to a government at a by-election, Peter Dutton’s immediate response was to change the narrative and pull his team in behind him. Within days, he called a snap parliamentary meeting and locked the Coalition into opposing a constitutionally enshrined Indigenous Voice to Parliament.

Dutton certainly opposed the Voice personally, but his decision was at least as much about shoring up his own leadership as about what the proposal would mean for the country. Focus group research had identified community confusion about the concept along with a simmering resentment at what the opposition leader calls “wokeness,” especially on the fringes of Australia’s big cities. He set about drawing those groups together and amplifying both sets of concerns.

This approach to policy-making became a pattern for the Liberals in the two ensuing years: taking a position more for political reasons than because it’s necessarily the best thing for Australia.

It may be a pollyannaish reflection in these social-media times, but good governments and oppositions have generally done it the other way around. They’ve decided what they believed was best for the country and then worked — hard — at taking the nation with them and turning the politics to their advantage.

Two years on, as the Liberals now contemplate snatching electoral defeat from genuine hopes of victory — hopes still not quite extinguished with just a day to go — this abandonment of values-based political practice is what has many long-time party members and supporters in despair. More than a few traditional Labor types are disillusioned with their own side for similar reasons, especially on environmental matters.

Still, that is only part of the story of the legacy of Aston. See Further Commentary and Articles arising from Books* and continued longer articles as noted in the blog. for the complete article.

Comment by former Greens voters

Some cited their determination to stop Peter Dutton. However, perhaps more serious for the Greens was the following opinion from ABC News:

…several former Greens voters also told the ABC they were unhappy with the party’s direction, including a shift away from the party’s core values, such as environmental issues, and a frustration with the Greens’ tendency to prioritise the “idealistic” over the practical.

“I am sick of division, hatred and policies that aren’t realistic and/or are idealistic and result in nothing … I want pragmatic policies that are fair,” said one voter from Rosanna who swung to Labor from the Greens in the seat of Jagajaga in Melbourne’s north-east.

Brilliant & Bold

From Jocelynne Scutt: Dear All – This is an early alert to Brilliant & Bold this coming Sunday 11 May 11am UK time – hoping to present a panel of speakers … one from US whom I met at CSW (Commission on the Status of Women) 69 in New York, a powerful speaker on women’s rights in the US from her African American perspective and heritage, a UK woman who attended CSW 69 for the first time – in 2024 she was an online delegate, this time in-person, an insightful participant reflecting on her experience of women’s rights in the UN portfolio, an Australian who runs a podcast envisioning the world for women – past, present, future with commentaries and interviews with a range of women from around the world, and (hopefully) a UK woman who has chosen gardening as her career – whom I met when on the campaign trail these past few months. The link is below so please save it where you can retrieve it readily …

Jocelynne Scutt is inviting you to a scheduled Zoom meeting.

Topic: Brilliant & Bold!
Time: May 11, 2025 11:00 AM London
Join Zoom Meeting
https://us02web.zoom.us/j/81146269710?pwd=zyxTVQIoqwLq2b4PsAKIBFa7bzcAe0.1

Meeting ID: 811 4626 9710
Passcode: 741954

Special Correspondent travelling from Perth to Canberra

Made our way across the longest ever road to Penong (with the windmill collection remember?) where we are camped up for the night in an actual caravan park to do washing and hopefully watch the election coverage.

Poppies at the Tower of London on my visit there in 2014. The display is repeated this year, again with ceramic poppies.