Booker Prize winner Alan Hollinghurst is not noted for his prolific output, so a new novel is always a great event. And his latest could be his best yet.

A new book and exhibition by photographer Fiona Pardington examines the historic - and now derided - practice of taking casts of people's heads to study their brains. Some were her ancestors.

Stir caused by opera character's sexual identity shows society still mired in paranoia.

Do you tire of the people who always bang on about how much better the book was than the movie? Well, you can rest easy if this James Bond yarn is ever committed to screen.

James K. Baxter wrote once (I paraphrase from lapsed memory and lost book) that most authors like to picture their words being read by grave scholars in studies and beautiful graduates in tutorials.

Nick Duerden talks to writer David Whitehouse and his agent about the difficulties of getting a book published.

Secrets and tragedy make this novel hard to put down, says Nicky Pellegrino.

Tim Carlsen comes close as a homeless busker in One Day Moko... and he's got the voice for the role.

Stephen Jewell talks to American author Charlaine Harris about why readers must not confuse her True Blood novels with the television series.

The latest novel from one of Italy's most eminent writers follows a young journalist from Florence as she sets out into Eastern Europe in the mid-1950s.

Chef Gabrielle Hamilton’s memoir is searingly honest, and funny. By Nicky Pellegrino.

Janet Evanovich is the US author of the best-selling Stephanie Plum stories and has just released the latest in the series Smokin' Seventeen.

So many books, so little time. Selecting books for Fiction Addiction is a delicious but sometimes difficult task, so this month we sought help by asking you what makes a good book club read.

The Girl In The Polka-dot Dress could be described as a "road novel", since most of the action takes place on the freeways of America as Harold Grasse drives his newly bought, second-hand camper from Maryland to California in the 1960s.

This book was honoured as the best pictorial book in this year's Cathay Pacific Travel Media Awards and it's easy to see why.

Two middle-aged ladies are central to Alan Bennett's reflective pair of comedies in Smut.

When anyone precious dies, most people attempt to keep their memory alive. This can be done by using their name a lot. Valuing the things they once touched. Or even wore.

When Michael King died in a road accident in 2004 at the age of 58, New Zealand lost one of its most admired writers and this collection, edited by his novelist daughter Rachael King, reminds us how he earned his reputation.

Tanya Moir's first novel is an example of historical fiction that brings to life a moment in time in a way that is graceful and thoughtful.

Sarah Quigley - or should I say Dr Sarah Quigley, for she has a doctorate in English literature from Oxford, no less - has long been recognised as one of New Zealand's finest writers.

As guest speaker at the International Writer's Block Festival, I was apprehensive that I might give the anguished attendees too much encouragement.

We ask the author of more than 60 books what he loves as a bookworm.

Michael Robotham's wife keeps him grounded, finds Nicky Pellegrino.