95bFM's Loose Reads: Stag Dance by Torrey Peters

Stag Dance is the latest outrageous literary offering by Women’s Prize shortlisted author Torrey Peters. Comprised of three short stories and a novella, Stag Dance writhes through genders and genres, refracting facets of gender through the light of romance, dystopia and classical Westerns.

Infect Your Friends and Loved Ones is set in a dystopian future, following dealers in a black market for hormones who hawk their wares to the trans and cis communities alike. The Chaser follows a young teenager at boarding school in his early stages of a crush that warps into a dysmorphic desire. The titular central novella, Stag Dance is a gripping Western centred around an annual courtship ritual amongst timber pirates.

This irreverent, pulsing collection of short stories explores the messy underbelly of gender identity and queer desire with shocking nuance and no easy answers.

The best short story collection I’ve read in ages!

95bFM's Loose Reads: Perfection by Vincenzo Latronico

We have a book from the International Booker Prize longlist, the big prize for both authors and translators.

Perfection was written in Italian, but is set in Berlin. Following creatives Anna & Tom as they navigate life & search for meaning as Millennials in a changing city.

Other books mentioned on today’s episode:
No Words for This by Ali Mau
A Life Less Punishing by Matt Heath
See How they Fall by Rachel Paris
The Let Them Theory by Mel Robbins
Careless People by Sarah Wynn-Williams

Listen to Jenna’s review with Jonny, in the bFM studio, below.

95bFM's Loose Reads: Clay Eaters by Gregory Kan

Gregory Kan is an Ockham shortlisted author living in Poneke who has released two acclaimed poetry collections; This Paper Boat in 2016 and Under Glass in 2019. He's also a coder who's created an incredible text manipulator called leaves.glass.

Clay Eaters is an eagerly-awaited release by Kan. This is a book of fragments- strands that tenuously link the past, present and future.

Clay Eaters explores the ephemeral nature of our corporeal bodies; spectres springing forty from decaying ends. As all turns to ash and returns to soil, new life awaits birth in the subterranean.

This is an incredible collection of poetry spanning Singapore, Poneke and the US- a perfect morsel when a novel’s too long.

95bFM's Loose Reads: The Antidote by Karen Russell

Over a decade since Time Out favourite, Swamplandia!, Karen Russell’s new novel The Antidote is here. Set in 1930’s Nebraska, in the time of The Dust Bowl, Russell weaves together history and magic to tell a tale full of rich characters, stunning writing and gives context to the effects of colonisation and the climate crisis. Highly, highly recommended.

Listen to Jenna’s review with Jonny, in the bFM studio below.

95bFM's Loose Reads: Dream Count by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie

Told with caustic wit, Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie's long-awaited fourth novel, Dream Count, follows the lives and complex relationships between four Nigerian women. 

Fans of Americanah will love Adichie's most recent return to fiction- a witty, funny and clever excision of womanhood and migration. 

Adichie explores the moulding of desire, love and friendship and the cracks of tension that emerge via the stratas of race, class and geography.

Clever, poignant and deliciously readable Dream Count cements Adichie as a generational talent akin to Anne Tyler and Sally Rooney. 

95bFM's Loose Reads: March Book News

Jenna has so much book news, that we’ve dedicated this week’s segment to it.

First, the shortlist for the Ockham New Zealand Book Awards has been announced. See the list of finalists here. The ceremony will be held on May 14th.
Secondly, a preview of names have been announced for the Auckland Writers Festival, with the full programme being release this Wednesday 12th March. Kaliane Bradley, Gavin Bishop, Yael van der Wouden, Ben Macintyre and Asako Yuzuki are just the start of an amazing programme.
Finally, New Zealand author Saraid de Silva’s Amma has been longlisted for the 2025 Women’s Prize for Fiction.

Listen to all the news & more below.

95bFM's Loose Reads: Fundamentally by Nussaibah Younis

Fundamentally is a debut novel by peace-keeping specialist Nussaibah Younis. 

Younis writes about a UN peace-keeping contingent based in Iraq and tells the story through the perspective of a criminologist specializing in deradicalization programmes. 

A hilarious piece of auto-fictional satire, Fundamentally skewers the saviour industrial complex and contends with the tangled politics of international relations.

Told with caustic wit, Fundamentally is a funny, highly readable story sure to help any reader out of their summer rut!

Listen to Suri’s call with Jonny in the studio below.

95bFM's Loose Reads: Old Soul by Susan Barker

Jenna & Jonny are in the studio this morning talking literary horror. Old Soul is a mysterious & unsettling tale traversing many countries on the hunt for a mysterious, dangerous woman.

For fans of David Mitchell, Stephen King and Mariana Enriquez, Susan Barker is the author of Time Out favourite, The Incarnations.

95bFM's Loose Reads: A Spring of Love by Celia Dale

First released in the 1960’s, a new Daunt Books edition of Celia Dale’s A Spring of Love has been newly republished.

Esther, a 30 year old ‘spinster’, lives with her Gran and has little reprieve from her mundane routine. She soon meets & starts a courtship with Raymond, a man of artificial charm who weasels his way into her life.

Reminiscent of Mary Gatskill and Shirley Jackson, A Spring of Love is a gripping and hilarious psychological thriller which explores the loneliness and desire of women and the men who prey on them.

You can also listen to Suri’s review of Celia Dale’s previous book, Sheep’s Clothing here.

95bFM's Loose Reads: Star Gazers by Duncan Sarkies

Abby gives you the low down on Star Gazers by Duncan Sarkies, a local read due for release this Thursday! If you're looking for a piece of fun and satirical fiction, Star Gazers is highly recommended. For fans of political intrigue, comedy and alpacas.

95bFM's Loose Reads: Dear Dickhead by Virginie Despentes

Translated from French, Dear Dickhead is a epistolary tale between cancelled crime author, Oscar and aging actress, Rebecca as they talk about feminism, generational difference and addiction.

Nuanced and very funny, Dear Dickhead is a great next step if you enjoyed All Fours. As Jonny says, ‘it sounds very French!’

95bFM's Loose Reads: Holding the Line by Barbara Kingsolver

Reprinted 29 years after its original publication, Holding the Line delves into one of the largest worker strikes in American history. 

Through extensive interviews with the women working gruelling manual jobs and fighting for collective rights at a huge personal cost, Kingsolver paints a portrait of some of America's historically most vulnerables workers.

Bold, extensively researched and written with as much flair as her later novels, Holding the Line illuminates a rarely explored part of history, told through the voices of some of America's most marginalised voices.

95bFM's Loose Reads: Some Strange Music Draws Me In by Griffin Hansbury

Named after Patti Smith’s Dancing Barefoot, Some Strange Music Draws Me In is both a visceral 1980’s, small town coming of age story and a modern day exploration of gender, generation differences, family & relationships.
Fun fact: As well as being an author, Griffin Hansbury is a psychoanalyst.

This shot up to being one of Jenna’s favourite books of 2024.

Listen below to Jenna & Jonny reunite in the studio for 2025.

95bFM's Loose Reads: Jenna's Christmas Agony Aunt answers

Jenna called into the studio for Time Out’s last session for the year! Listeners texted in for book advice, including sci-fi for teens, Egyptology for an 8 year old and non-mainstream reads for a dude. Jonny needs a summer read too, plus some advice on 2024 cookbooks.

Time Out is open from 9am-9pm to help with all your Christmas needs. Gift wrapping included.

Listen below!

95bFM's Loose Reads: Suri's Christmas picks & Agony Aunt answers

Suri & Jonny are in the studio with a HEAP of Christmas recommendations.

Listen in for some agony aunt answers - including advice on science fiction, graphic novels and self help.

Then, Suri picks out some of her top gift picks, including:

Time of the Child by Niall Williams
The Garden of Time by Olivia Laing
James by Percival Everett
The Gavin Bishop Treasury
What I Ate by Stanley Tucci
Ātūa Wāhine by Hana Tapiata

Click the link below for audio.

95bFM's Loose Reads: Juice by Tim Winton

Jenna & Jonny talk Juice, the new dystopion novel by Australian living legend, Tim Winton. This pacy novel set in the North Western Australian desert, imagines a world of climate crisis but underpins the fear with the hope of humanity.

Listen to the full review below.

95bFM's Loose Reads: The Message by Ta-Nehisi Coates

Author of the National Book award-winning title Between the World and Me, Ta Nehisi-Coates returns to non-fiction with The Message. In this concise but powerful title, Nehisi-Coates explores the human impulse to mythologise the world around us. 

Part travelogue, part history, Ta Nehisi-Coates moves between Senegal, South Carolina and Palestine to reveal the connective tissues that allowed for the exploitation of certain ethnicities in all three countries. Coates explores how racism and colonialism are constructed in the pursuit of capital and in the process of national-building.

A great intro to the history of segregation and colonialism, The Message is the perfect gift for a new reader of critical theory and a great companion to Baldwin, Arendt and Fanon.

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

95bFM's Loose Reads: Orbital by Samantha Harvey

Jenna dives into the newly minted 2024 Booker winner, Orbital, by Samantha Harvey. Orbital is due back in stock in December - order below!

Listen to Jenna’s review with Jonny below, as well as some big gig chat from the weekend.

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.