'Penguin Shorts, Penguin's digital series of short works, offers readers engaging, entertaining non-fiction and fiction for approximately the same price as a cup of coffee, designed to be read over a long commute or during a lunch hour.
'Shorts colours are inspired by the original Penguin Livery: Orange - Fiction, Dark blue - Memoir, Yellow - History, Pink - Cookery and Turquoise - Contemporary nonfiction.
'"Our ambition in this digital publishing venture is not to experiment with quality but with form: our aim is to fill a current gap by bringing readers high-quality work that is too short for a book and too long for a magazine, so that you need never be without a something satisfying to read."' - Ben Ball, Publishing Director, Penguin General
Source: Penguin website, http://www.penguin.com.au/
Sighted: 07/05/2012
'Juniper, living deep in the forest with her parents, is stunned to discover that the beautiful girl living isolated in a nearby tower is her sister. When the two girls meet, what begins as a fascination and a friendship ultimately develops into something truly sinister.
'A story of jealousy, passion and power, Beauty's Sister is a dark and gripping reimagining of one of our oldest tales, Rapunzel, from acclaimed novelist James Bradley.' (From the publisher's website.)
Camberwell : Penguin , 2012'Haunted by the brutal murder of a local couple, David heads to his weekend shack with his new lover, Lydia, and his children from his recently crumbled marriage. Together they find escape, if only briefly, in the ocean and the bush.
'"The Bodysurfers", the title story of Robert Drewe's classic first collection, is a vivid evocation of love, passion, terror and the beauty of the beach.' (From the publisher's website, 2012 Penguin publication.)
Camberwell : Penguin , 2012'A young Vietnamese-Australian named Nam, in his final year at the famed Iowa Writers' Workshop, is trying to find his voice on the page. When his father, a man with a painful past, comes to visit, Nam's writing and sense of self are both deeply changed.
'Love and Honour and Pity and Pride and Compassion and Sacrifice is a deeply moving story of identity, family and the wellsprings of creativity, from Nam Le's multi-award-winning collection The Boat.' (From the publisher's website, 2012 Penguin publication.)
Camberwell : Penguin , 2012'In homage to that most civilised of activities, letter writing, Marieke Hardy and Michaela McGuire created the literary afternoons of Women of Letters. Some of Australia's finest dames of stage, screen and page have delivered missives on a series of themes.
'Published here for the first time are Deborah Conway writing about the ups and downs of being a dog owner in "A Letter to the Best Decision I Ever Made"; Ita Buttrose imagining an alternative life as an opera singer in "A Letter to the Life I Could Have Lived"; Tracee Hutchison writing "A Complaint Letter" to complaint letters; Pip Lincolne describing a magical childhood afternoon in "A Letter to the Moment I Knew it Was Time to Go Home"; "A Love Letter" from Kate Miller-Heidke aged twenty-nine to Kate Miller-Heidke aged twelve; and Helen Garner looking back on a teacher both terrifying and inspiring in "A Letter to the Person I Misjudged".
'Touching, funny and wise, this brand new collection of letters is a captivating tribute to correspondence.' (From the publisher's website.)
Camberwell : Penguin , 2012