INDIE BOOKSHOPS IN NEWCASTLE, NSW


Staying in Newcastle, NSW over the Easter holiday weekend I have found two excellent Indie booksellers - MacLean's Booksellers (pic left) at 69 Beaumont Street - www.macleansbooks.com.au - and Book Hog at 194 Union Street.

  At the former I bought Reading by Moonlight by Breanda Walker Hamish Hamilton and at the latter I picked up TOSSED - 200 fast, fresh and fabulous salads from leading Aussie cookbook specialist publisher Murdoch Books.

Reading by Moonlight: How books saved a life
Author: Brenda Walker
A memoir of reading and healing

The first time Brenda Walker packed her bag to go into hospital, she wondered which book to take with her. As a novelist and professor of literature, her life had been built around reading and writing. Now she was also a patient, being treated for breast cancer, fighting for her life and afraid for herself and her family. But turning to medicine didn't mean she turned away from fiction. Books had always been her solace and sustenance, and now choosing the right one was the most important thing she could do for herself.

In Reading by Moonlight, Brenda describes the five stages of her treatment and how different books and authors helped her through the tumultuous process of recovery. As well as offering wonderful introductions and insights into the work of writers like Dante, Tolstoy, Nabokov, Beckett and Dickens, Brenda shows how the very process of reading – surrendering and then regathering yourself – echoes the process of healing.
About the author:
Brenda Walker is the author of the novels Crush, One More River, Poe's Cat and The Wing of Night. She is also a critic, essayist and editor and teaches at the University of Western Australia.

TOSSED - 200 fast, fresh and fabulous salads

I had recently decided that it was time I started becoming more varied and bolder in the salads I make and when I came across this book I thought to myself here is the inspiration I need to achieve that. Recipes and text by the staff at the Murdoch Books test kitchen with stunning photography by Tim Robinson and styling by Sarah DeNardi.

The Book Hog was a bookshop with a difference offering a wide range including titles on Art, Architecture & Design, Complementary Health, Buddhism, Esoteric, Psychology, Philosophy, History, Science & Nature
New Age and more. Almost an "alternative" bookshop I guess but at the same timne having a wide range of main stream titles including latest fiction and a most impressive cookery section. At the rear of the store was a large section featuring non-book product from India, Vietnam, Thailand and other Asian countries.