ABC Bookshelf by Eva Alessandrini and Roberto Saporiti. Image via Saporiti
Reader habits at the start of each year typically focus on beach reads: crime, thrillers and chick lit. But long-time Mary Martin bookstore staffer Suzanne Garcia said once people get back to work that soon changes. ’The big names start coming through and literary works start picking up,’ she said.
That’s when publishers and booksellers turn their attention to the books that they will promote and start generating buzz around favoured titles.
Garcia predicts that 2015 will see a change in the way that books are presented, with a greater divide between the low and high ends of the market. ‘Memoirs, cook books, art books – they will continue to come as beautiful hard cover editions, rather than the kind of cheaper books than can’t compete with online pricing,’ she said.
She also expects a trend to localistion countering the global push of the publishing industry. ‘Local publishers are looking at home grown writers and are speaking more to a local audience, balancing the big names with something more local.’
But as always the most important predictions focus on individual titles. Here are some of those expected to garner interest in 2015.
The Buried Giant by Kazuo Ishiguro
Kazuo Ishiguro is not a prolific author so expectations are high for The Buried Giant, which arrives on bookshelves in early March. ‘It’s his first book in 10 years and we’re all eagerly awaiting that one,’ said Garcia. ‘He makes for compelling literary fiction. Line by line, the writing is a cut above your general page turner.’
Wheeler Centre Director Michael Williams is also looking forward to The Buried Giant. ‘I’m a massive fan of Kazuo Ishiguro. It’s his first work since Never Let Me Go, which was an absolute masterpiece. The new books from him are always a big deal. I’m patiently waiting for my copy,’ he said.
Ishiguro’s work has been varied so Williams is curious to see the style he adopts for The Buried Giant. ‘Some of his work has a dreamlike quality and so it remains to be seen if this is another crowd pleaser in the veins of The Remains of the Day or Never Let Me Go, or if he is back to the difficult territory of The Absent Soul. Either way I love him.’
Hot Little Hands by Abigail Ulman
Newcomers rarely have the advantage of anticipation, but Melbourne writer Abigail Ulman’s first short story collection is generating serious excitement, thanks to the great reception she has received from the individual stories she has already published.
Ulman first made her mark with the story ‘Chagall’s Wife’ in Meanjin. The collection brings together stories is about young women of different ages, from their early teens to their late twenties, coming to terms with what it means to desire, and be desired, with funny, surprising and sometimes confronting results.
‘The short stories she has published elsewhere show she is a serious talent, and this is the first collection, and it will be fascinating to see,’ said Williams.
So you’ve been publicly shamed by Jon Ronson
What if Christine Keeler had come to public attention on Twitter? Even Bill Clinton escaped the age of constant communication. But the stakes are much higher for anyone publicly shamed today.
Jon Ronson has spent the past three years meeting those who have been subject to public shaming and exploring the implications in the age of social media and pervasive communication.
Ronson’s last book The Psychopath Test: A Journey Through the Madness Industry hit the Sunday Times bestseller list, confirming what many had long feared: the boss is a psychopath. The latest is expected to garner some sympathy for those subject to public humiliation as well as a good deal of schadenfreude and relief.
In the Unlikely Event by Judy Blume
Veteran children’s writer Judy Blume has surprised the industry by producing a book for adults in 2015. Australian Writers Centre National Director Valerie Khoo is curious to know what the author of Are You There, God. It’s me Margaret? and Blubber can do for a more mature audience.
‘She is synonymous with young adult books and, even though she has written for adults before, it’s been 16 years since she last released a book for adults. All eyes are going to be on what she’s going to come up with this time,’ said Khoo.
With an eerie sense of timeliness, Blume’s fictional tale is set around a series of real-life plane crashes that occurred in Elizabeth, New Jersey, over a three month period in 1951-1952.
Relativity by Antonia Hayes
Co-director of the Australian National Young Writers’ Festival, Antonia Hayes will release her novel Relativity this year and her high profile in the industry means it is getting a lot of attention.
‘I’m looking forward to her, I’m always on the look out for new Australian authors,’ said Garcia. ‘Her book sounds unusual. Relativity is being compared to The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time and A Beautiful Mind. It sounds kind of quirky.’
The Hate Race by Maxine Beneba Clarke
Beneba Clarke started in the literary world as a poet: she is a slam poetry champion, and the author of the poetry collections Gil Scott Heron is on Parole (Picaro Press, 2009) and Nothing Here Needs Fixing (Picaro Press, 2013) the title poem of which won the 2013 Ada Cambridge Poetry Prize. But her collection of short stories Foreign Soil won the 2013 Victorian Premier’s Literary Award for an Unpublished Manuscript, sparking a bidding war of the kind authors dream about.
Garcia, who loved Foreign Soil, is looking forward to The Hate Race, a memoir focused on racism by the Australian writer of Afro-Caribbean descent.
‘The way she uses language will make it interesting to see how she approaches non-fiction. She is active in Melbourne and she has put up excerpts on her website and Right Now, the human rights website. It’s pretty touching, emotive and confronting subject matter.’
Defending Gallipoli by Harvey Broadbent
The 100th anniversary of Gallipoli is prompting a burst of publishing and filmmaking. Harvey Broadbent’s Defending Gallipoli, released in March is likely to be different from most: approaching the conflict from the Turkish side.
‘Harvey Broadbent is well known for dealing with Australian history, and is a well respected historian in that sense. He is taking a look that we tend to not look at so much, in terms of the enemy side I guess, the Turkish side of things, which should be interesting in getting a more rounded view of Australian history,’ said Garcia.
The Soldier’s Wife by Pamela Freeman
Continuing the military theme, Khoo said Australian author Pamela Freeman is releasing The Soldier’s Wife under Pamela Hart in March. ‘She’s already the author of crime, fantasy and books for children,’ said Khoo.
‘Her 30th book is due out in 2015. The Soldier’s Wife is straight fiction and a departure from Pamela’s usual style. There’s lot of buzz in the industry about this book.’
Purity by Jonathan Franzen
Last time he published a novel – Freedom in 2010, Jonathan Franzen appeared on the cover of Time magazine labelled ‘Great American Novelist’. Purity is his fifth novel including Pulitzer Prize winner The Corrections.
‘His books are always bestsellers and there’s a lot of anticipation – and pressure – for this next one to live up to the hype,’ said Khoo.
A departure from previous works Purity is a multigenerational American epic with a surreal quality. ‘‘There’s a kind of fabulist quality to it. It’s not strict realism. There’s a kind of mythic undertone to the story,’ Franzen’s publisher Jonathan Galessi from Straus & Giroux told the New York Times.
Unnamed works
Three authors whose new books have yet to be fully announced but are already eagerly awaited are Kate Grenville, Geraldine Brooks and George RR Martin.
Grenville’s book is a biography of her own mother and Williams is excited to learn more about the book, which will be published in April. ‘I don’t know much more about it, but a new book from Kate is very exciting.
‘Her most recent novels have all been historical novels and her capacity to combine research and factual material with a beautiful poetry on the line means that a book on personal subject such as her own mother will be very beautifully handled.’
Pulitzer Prize winner Geraldine Brooks has set historical works in the American civil war, the bubonic plague period in England and World War II Sarajevo. This year she will mine a new kind of history in a work set in the Biblical period of King David.
‘I can’t not mention that,’ said Garcia. ‘She’s an absolute powerhouse. When she takes on a period – and she has done so many different kinds of historical periods, the American Civil war more notably, she looks at the language and she looks at the history at such an in-depth way, it completely immerses you in a different time, in a really natural way.’
In genre fiction, the big wait will be for the next instalment from George RR Martin in his Song of Fire and Ice series. ‘Not only readers are hanging out for it, no doubt it will keep a host of actors and producers busy in Hollywood as well,’ said Khoo.
