December 2019, no. 417
Welcome to the December issue of ABR – always our most anticipated edition of the year because of the inclusion of Books of the Year. Thirty-three leading critics and writers nominate their favourite publications of the year. Find out what people like Beejay Silcox, James Ley, Susan Wyndham, Andrea Goldsmith, and Bronwyn Lea most enjoyed reading in 2019. Other highlights include Peter Rose on Helen Garner’s brilliant and defiant diaries; Zora Simic on the legacies of sexual harassment; Angela Woollacott on Margaret Simons’s biography of Penny Wong; and Chris Flynn on Elliot Perlman’s new novel. Elsewhere, legendary journalist Brian Toohey reviews Edward Snowden’s memoirs, Monash historian Christina Twomey laments the ‘terror in extraterritoriality’, and the poet Michael Hofmann contributes a brilliant satire on Donal Dump (aka Donald Trump).