95bFM's Loose Reads: Blue Ruin by Hari Kunzru

The third title in Hari Kunzru’s Colours trilogy, Blue Ruin is a COVID-era novel taking aim at the art world. The novel follows Jay, a former artist whose descent from rising young art star to middle-aged manual labourer leaves his body and heart in disrepair. Crossing paths with his former lover Alice and her husband Rob (Jay’s art-school rival and a benefactor of wealthy corporate philanthropists), Jay’s life begins to take new shape.

Blue Ruin shifts between the 1990's and current day, covering the Young British Artists movement and the COVID-era landscape. Exploring the relationship between philanthropists and artists, between art and assets and between artistic integrity and survival, Blue Ruin unveils the winners and losers in art and in life and the financial precarity of those who lose. 

Listen to Suri’s review in the 95bFM studio with Jonny below.

95bFM's Loose Reads: The Safekeep by Yael van der Wouden

Jenna visited the studio this morning to give a rundown on the upcoming announcement of the 2024 Booker Prize (November 13th NZD time and talk about the deut Dutch shortlistee, The Safekeep by Yael van der Wouden.

Set in the 1960’s, in a house in a small Dutch village, Isabel’s rigid routine is upended when her brother’s new girlfriend comes to stay for the summer. However, not is all what it seems.The less you know about this book, the better!

Clcik the link below to listen to Jenna and Jonny’s chat.

95bFM's Loose Reads: Delirious by Damien Wilkins

Jenna phoned from the shop floor to talk about Wellington author Damien Wilkins’ new book, Delirious.

As Mary and Pete prepare to move out of their home and into a retirement village, the past comes back to visit. A deceptively simple read that is masterly crafted about family, memory and grief.

Listen to Jenna & Jonny at the link below.

95bFM's Loose Reads: A Sunny Place for Shady People by Mariana Enriquez

The queen of South American horror fiction is back with a new collection of short stories for the spooky season! From hauntings, cults, surgical disasters and beyond, Mariana Enriquez’s new book ‘A Sunny Place for Shady People’ explores the human-made violence and terror inflicted in unique ways onto each of her characters. From body horror, ghosts and psychological torture, this short story collection has something to sate the appetite of all fans of horror. 

Pre-order now to nab your copy just in time for Halloween!

The breath out: Kataraina by Becky Manawatu, reviewed by Jenna

Jenna responds to Kataraina, the sequel to Becky Manawatu’s award-winning first novel Auē, for The Spinoff:

95bFM's Loose Reads: Kataraina by Becky Manawatu

Jenna was back in the bFM studio this morning after being overseas. First, she delves a little into her booky trip to the UK. Then, talks about the highly anticipated sequel to Auē, Kataraina.

Listen to the spoiler free chat with Jonny below, you can also read her spoiler-filled review on The Spinoff here.

Finally, Jenna also chats about Aotearoa NZ Bookshop Day, which is this Saturday 12th October.

95bFM's Loose Reads: The Empusium by Olga Tokarczuk

Winner of the 2018 International Booker Prize and 2018 Nobel Prize for literature, Olga Tokarczuk returns to fiction with a heady, atmospheric 'health resort horror story'. 

Written 100 years after the publication of The Magic Mountain, The Empusium is written both as a response and a feminist retelling of Thomas Mann's canonical work.

We follow Miczyslaw Wojnik's arrival at a sanatorium set in the lush and dense mountainous forests of Germany, where the alpine air is touted as an antidote to all its inhabitants' ills. 

Following strict regimens of diet and exercise and using their downtime to muse on the state of a nation on the brink of war, the patients are aware of beady eyes following every move- are they being watched by the staff? Or is there a more sinister presence lurking in the shadows of the mountain fauna?

A novel filled with socratic dialogue and a rich, divinical atmosphere, The Empusium is a stunning and sinister exploration into the roots of facism and misogyny, as relevant today as it's predecessor was almost a century ago.

95bFM's Loose Reads: Pātea Boys/Ngāti Pātea by Airana Ngarewa

I pānui a Abby i Pātea Boys/Ngāti Pātea nā Airana Ngarewa mō Te Wiki o Te Reo Māori. Ka kōrero ia ki a Jonny mō tēnei pukapuka whakamīharo: (arohamai, e ako tonu ana ahau!)

From the bestselling author of The Bone Tree comes a lively and playful bilingual collection of stories about growing up in Pātea. Interlinked and full of recurring characters, these stories are about growing up in small-town Aotearoa - sneaking away during cross country or doing bombs while the lifeguard isn't looking.

The collection is designed to bridge a gap between children's books in te reo and full-length literary works. With each story featured in both English and te reo Māori, it's the perfect resource for those on their reo learning journeys as well as for readers who enjoyed The Bone Tree.

95bFM's Loose Reads: Help Wanted by Adele Waldman

Biting, sharp and funny, ‘Help Wanted’ by Adelle Waldman follows the daily rhythms and tribulations of workers in the big box megastore, Town Square. Desperate to escape the grips of their line manager Meredith, the employees band together to plot her removal. 

Shifting perspectives between the workers, this novel explores the unimportant but omnipresent rules and structures governing the daily lives of workers chained to their jobs and class.

Irreverent, funny and whip-smart, ‘Help Wanted’ is a millennial workplace novel that unearths the bureaucracy of management and the physical and mental aches of working class life in America.

95bFM's Loose Reads: Brat by Gabriel Smith

Abby and Jonny chat about Brat, the debut novel from Gabriel Smith:

Jonas Gabriel is an aspiring writer struggling to come to terms with the death of his father and the terminal illness of his mother. Suffering from a rare condition that makes his skin to peel off like a reptile, he can’t seem to stop offending relatives and family friends, often at considerable physical cost to himself.

Escaping the spectre of the girlfriend who has left him and the literary agent chasing him for the novel he has not even started, he returns to his family home to prepare it to be sold. Alone in the house, his skin shedding in ever-increasing frequency and quantity, with nothing but benzos, booze and memories for company, things take an uncanny turn: a manuscript for a novel written by his mother keeps changing, an old home video is similarly unstable and may reveal unsettling secrets, the house is becoming encased in Russian vines and a man dressed as a deer keeps appearing in the back garden.

While handling age-old themes of mortality, familial love and the impermanence of art, Brat is not quite like anything you’ve ever read before. At once a dark and disquieting ghost story, a unique and brilliant meditation on grief, and a profoundly funny Bildungsroman in which the protagonist’s education is anything but sentimental, it is a work of electrifying originality and bravura virtuosity by a major new literary talent. 

Listen below!

95bFM's Loose Reads: Alphabetical Diaries by Sheila Heti

Suri talks to Jonny about Sheila Heti’s latest memoir which is an exploration of form and a radical experiment in diary writing.

Each chapter includes diary entries out of chronological order and in a system of alphabetisation- every sentence within a chapter begins with the same letter. From reading Faulkner to kissing in the supermarket, Alphabetical Diaries offers an intimate insight into the minutiae of Heti’s daily life and habits with a playful, poetic flair.

Listen below!

95bFM's Loose Reads: The Mermaid Chronicles by Megan Dunn

Jenna talks to Molly about The Mermaid Chronicles, the new, swimmingly good mer-moir from Megan Dunn.

The true tale of how one woman's lifelong obsession became a midlife mermaid odyssey, from the irrepressibly witty author of Tinderbox and Things I Learned at Art School.

Listen below!

95bFM's Loose Reads: Blackouts by Justin Torres

Winner of The National Book Award in America, Blackouts is a clever and moving read. A love story between two men - young and old - as they reckon with queer histories and their place within them.

Listen to Suri and Jonny talk about it below.

95bFM's Loose Reads: The Survivors by Steve Braunias

Jenna has Father’s Day on her mind, with a recommendation that would be great for your Dad, or quite frankly, just yourself!

Auckland based journalist Steve Braunias has declared The Survivors is his last book of true crime. Some cases you will know, others Steve was the only media in the room. This series of essays that depicts the human condition, with insight, investigation and humour.

Listen to Jenna & Jonny chat about it below.

95bFM's Loose Reads: Creation Lake by Rachel Kushner

Told through the eyes of sharp-eyed secret agent Sadie Smith, Creation Lake is a genre-bending espionage tale, with an unexpectedly philosophical core. Set in the ancient caves and dried lakes of France, this atmospheric novel follows Sadie as she infiltrates an extremist group intent on unraveling civilization and replacing it with a primordial society. Headed by the charismatic and evasive Bruno, the group plots violent acts intended to pull Europe back into the Bronze Age. 

A surprising and fascinating cat-and-mouse chase, Creation Lake asks existential questions about human and civilizational origins whilst remaining thrilling up to its last words.

This is Rachel Kushner's second Booker longlisted title and perhaps her most rigorous one yet. Creation Lake is released early September.

95bFM's Loose Reads: Behind You is the Sea by Susan Muaddi Darraj

Behind You is the Sea is a collection of linked stories based around a community of Palestinians in Baltimore. Richly developed and compelling, this book is a new favourite at the shop!

Listen to Jenna & Jonny chat about it below.

95bFM's Loose Reads: My Friends by Hisham Matar

Suri declares My Friends by Hisham Matar one of her favourite reads of 2024 and one to look out for on the Booker Longlist (which is announced next week).

My Friends is a political novel that follows three Libyan men, exiled in London, and their friendship’s journey, weaving together fictional characters along side real events. With themes of loss, grief and friendship, My Friends reveals uncomfortable truths about finding your identity whilst away from home.

Suri phoned into the studio, listen to her review with Jonny below.

95bFM's Loose Reads: All That We Know by Shilo Kino

All That We Know is a Tāmaki Makaurau based, coming of age novel about Māreikura Pohe and her journey in rumaki reo whilst navigating viral fame, whānau, activism and relationships.

This book is funny, nuanced and asks hard questions - of its characters and the reader.

This has become a fast Time Out staff favourite, it’s for fans of Rebecca K. Reilly’s Greta & Valdin and Coco Solid’s How to Loiter in a Turf War.

Listen below!

95bFM's Loose Reads: The Mark by Frida Isberg

Teetering on the edge of dystopia, debut novel The Mark, takes place in a future Iceland where the device Zoe plays videos to soothe minds ill-at-rest and an Empathy Test determines your societal status.

Starting weeks before an explosive referendum to make the Empathy Test mandatory, The Mark follows the story of four characters: lonely, isolated Tristan fearful of what the Test will mean for his future job prospects, Vetur, a teacher worried about the prospects of her failing students and Eyjal, a corporate office worker facing dismissal and Oli, a psychiatrist who heads the organization responsible for creating and administering the test. 

A compulsive, addictive read for fans of Black Mirror

95bFM's Loose Reads: Caledonian Road by Andrew O'Hagan

Today we welcome Jonny as bFM’s new breakfast host with the heifty 650-paged Caledonian Road by writer and journalist, Andrew O’Hagan.

A huge cast weaves together fully realised characters from all walks of life - an art writer, a Robin Hood style hacker plus Lords, politicians, Russian oligarchs and migrants. This is a Dickensian epic that tells a tale of modern London. It is also readable! and funny!

Jenna is tipping this for a Booker nod - the longlist is announced on July 31st.

Listen below!