{"title":"Erotic, Obsessive, Transgressive","description":"\u003cp\u003e\u003cmeta charset=\"utf-8\"\u003eFiction of charged desire, fixation, taboo, seduction, and sexual power. Books where want turns unruly, risky, compulsive, or destabilising.\u003c\/p\u003e","products":[{"product_id":"the-first-bad-man-by-miranda-july","title":"'The First Bad Man' by Miranda July","description":"\u003ch4 data-start=\"105\" data-end=\"431\"\u003e\n\u003cmeta charset=\"utf-8\"\u003eA book about July's whole thing, how desire actually behaves.\u003c\/h4\u003e\n\u003cp data-start=\"105\" data-end=\"431\"\u003eCheryl Glickman lives a tightly controlled life built around routines, self-surveillance, and small private rituals that feel almost devotional. She is obsessed with bodily health, haunted by half-articulated sexual fantasies, and quietly braced against the world. Then Clee arrives.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp data-start=\"453\" data-end=\"838\"\u003eBetween fantasy and flesh, submission and control, care and cruelty. July pushes intimacy into strange, uncomfortable shapes, writing about female desire, violence, masochism, and dependency without apology or reassurance. The body here is not symbolic — it is awkward, leaky, charged, and deeply sincere.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp data-start=\"840\" data-end=\"1110\"\u003eA cult novel for readers interested in embodiment, power, and the limits of psychological tidiness.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"bower studio","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":43411010814035,"sku":null,"price":9.0,"currency_code":"AUD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0689\/0268\/2707\/files\/Untitleddesign-2026-03-25T091601.465_bcb831a5-2831-4834-b322-3741d8359722.png?v=1774390638"},{"product_id":"a-man-and-two-women-by-doris-lessing","title":"'A Man and Two Women' by Doris Lessing","description":"\u003ch4 data-start=\"130\" data-end=\"516\"\u003e\n\u003cmeta charset=\"utf-8\"\u003eThe title piece, “A Man and Two Women,” is about two marriages and the desperation that underlies them rather than any conventional ménage à trois.\u003c\/h4\u003e\n\u003ch4 data-start=\"130\" data-end=\"516\"\u003eHot? Or not?\u003c\/h4\u003e\n\u003cp data-start=\"130\" data-end=\"516\"\u003e\u003cmeta charset=\"utf-8\"\u003e\u003cem data-start=\"325\" data-end=\"346\"\u003eA Man and Two Women\u003c\/em\u003e collects nineteen stories that lay bare the emotional mechanics of relationships, desire, and social expectation. Many pieces examine familiar domestic and social situations — a cottage weekend with old friends, a mother’s withdrawal after childbirth, the collisions between ambition and intimacy — but Lessing’s focus is always psychological rather than plot-driven.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp data-start=\"130\" data-end=\"516\"\u003eCharacters present themselves as ordinary, but beneath the surface simmer discontent, delusion, and unspoken tension. \u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp data-start=\"130\" data-end=\"516\"\u003eAcross the collection, Lessing’s prose is precise on revealing how assumptions, resentment, and unexamined motives shape lives and desires. Don't expect to be consoled.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"bower studio","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":43411066880083,"sku":null,"price":25.0,"currency_code":"AUD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0689\/0268\/2707\/files\/ScholarsCreatingDigitalMapsofSpinoza_sEthics-2026-03-12T143144.252.png?v=1773286314"},{"product_id":"the-young-and-the-evil-by-charles-henri-ford-and-parker-tyler","title":"'The Young and the Evil' by Charles Henri-Ford and Parker Tyler","description":"\u003ch4 data-start=\"93\" data-end=\"502\"\u003e\n\u003cmeta charset=\"utf-8\"\u003eStill disruptive. Still funny. Still not interested in your feelings.\u003c\/h4\u003e\n\u003cp data-start=\"93\" data-end=\"502\"\u003eA cult novel of queer life in 1930s New York, written in collaboration by Charles Henri-Ford and Parker Tyler. \u003cem data-start=\"216\" data-end=\"240\"\u003eThe Young and the Evil\u003c\/em\u003e follows a loose circle of artists, hustlers, writers, and drifters moving through bars, apartments, and late-night conversations. Plot is secondary to atmosphere: desire, ambition, cruelty, boredom, and self-invention collide in short scenes and sharp dialogue.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp data-start=\"504\" data-end=\"799\"\u003eFirst published in Paris after being deemed unpublishable in the United States, the book is frank, caustic, and deliberately unserious about respectability. \u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp data-start=\"504\" data-end=\"799\"\u003eDennis Cooper writes on it \u003ca href=\"https:\/\/denniscooperblog.com\/spotlight-on-charles-henri-ford-and-parker-tyler-the-young-and-evil-1933\/\"\u003ehere\u003c\/a\u003e. \u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"bower studio","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":43412201832531,"sku":null,"price":18.0,"currency_code":"AUD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0689\/0268\/2707\/files\/Untitleddesign-2026-02-11T152414.161.png?v=1770783862"},{"product_id":"vurt-by-jeff-noon","title":"'Vurt' by Jeff Noon","description":"\u003ch4 data-start=\"120\" data-end=\"473\"\u003eFirst published in 1993, \u003cem data-start=\"145\" data-end=\"151\"\u003eVurt\u003c\/em\u003e is a cult cyberpunk novel from the UK’s stranger edge of the genre.\u003c\/h4\u003e\n\u003cp data-start=\"120\" data-end=\"473\"\u003eSet in a hallucinatory Manchester where reality fractures through illicit feathers — gateways to shared dreamworlds — the novel follows Scribble and his crew as they move between bodies, identities, and states of consciousness that refuse to stay fixed.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp data-start=\"475\" data-end=\"777\"\u003eJeff Noon’s writing is elastic, surreal, and deeply local: part rave culture, part myth, part proto-virtual reality. Long before VR became a corporate promise, \u003cem data-start=\"635\" data-end=\"641\"\u003eVurt\u003c\/em\u003e imagined digital immersion as something feral; like where desire, technology, and the body bleed into one another.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp data-start=\"779\" data-end=\"959\"\u003eA foundational text of British cyberpunk and experimental sci-fi, \u003cem data-start=\"845\" data-end=\"851\"\u003eVurt\u003c\/em\u003e sits somewhere between William Gibson, Ballardian unreality, and the anarchic spirit of the early internet.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"bower studio","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":43445937700947,"sku":null,"price":12.0,"currency_code":"AUD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0689\/0268\/2707\/files\/b80e7ef8-fe8e-4d3d-82cf-c46a2c29661c.jpg?v=1768886351"},{"product_id":"beautiful-losers-by-leonard-cohen","title":"'Beautiful Losers' by Leonard Cohen","description":"\u003ch4 data-start=\"246\" data-end=\"659\"\u003e\n\u003cmeta charset=\"utf-8\"\u003eSex, mourning, and faith bleed into one another with one of the most famed lyricists of our time.\u003c\/h4\u003e\n\u003cp data-start=\"246\" data-end=\"659\"\u003eSet largely in a Montreal apartment that functions as both domestic space and private hell, the book follows a bereaved narrator obsessively reconstructing love, betrayal, and loss through memory, fantasy, and blasphemy.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp data-start=\"661\" data-end=\"1006\"\u003eA tangled triangle of two men and a woman spirals toward repetition and ruin, while the figure of Catherine Tekakwitha — a seventeenth-century Iroquois saint — hovers as an impossible source of grace. Redemption here is erotic, violent, and profoundly unstable.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp data-start=\"1008\" data-end=\"1222\"\u003eIncandescent in its language, \u003cem data-start=\"1072\" data-end=\"1090\"\u003eBeautiful Losers\u003c\/em\u003e remains one of the defining experimental novels of the 1960s. We love.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp data-start=\"1008\" data-end=\"1222\"\u003ePriced because it's a beautiful hardback edition from Banned Books in great condition.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"bower studio","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":43448724750419,"sku":null,"price":20.0,"currency_code":"AUD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0689\/0268\/2707\/files\/32cac9b0-5412-44bf-b4bd-06db1b2d0b98.jpg?v=1768948213"},{"product_id":"mantissa-by-john-fowles","title":"'Mantissa' by John Fowles","description":"\u003ch4 data-start=\"99\" data-end=\"584\"\u003eOkay SO this is one of my favourite books I've found because it taught me about the Taiwanese book pirating moment in the 80's \/ 90's and I looooove cult objects like this.\u003c\/h4\u003e\n\u003cp data-start=\"99\" data-end=\"584\"\u003e\u003cmeta charset=\"utf-8\"\u003eThe fascimile pages were all scanned, the Taiwanese printer in the book copyright section, and the classic flip of the surname on the spine. All flags of an unauthorised English-language edition, produced during the late-20th-century “pirate publishing” period. This was when presses in Taiwan reproduced Western literary and academic texts with their first edition or valuable edition look for regional circulation. These editions are not scarce in a traditional rare-book sense, but are increasingly collected as material artefacts of informal literary economies and Cold War-era knowledge circulation.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp data-start=\"99\" data-end=\"584\"\u003eThe story \u003cem data-start=\"118\" data-end=\"128\"\u003eMantissa\u003c\/em\u003e is John Fowles being meta. It's a compressed, abrasive novel structured as a series of arguments between an author and his unruly muse. Drawing on classical myth, psychoanalysis, and postmodern theory, the book stages authorship itself as a contested space—gendered, performative, and unstable. It sits late in Fowles’ career, closer in spirit to Borges or Barth than his other books.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp data-start=\"1000\" data-end=\"1135\"\u003e\u003cem data-start=\"1000\" data-end=\"1015\"\u003eEdition note:\u003c\/em\u003e Unauthorised Taiwanese paperback. Offset printed. Noticeable cover wear and spine creasing consistent with age and use.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"bower studio","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":43899844067411,"sku":null,"price":18.0,"currency_code":"AUD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0689\/0268\/2707\/files\/0412e073-1820-4e00-9269-070fe831e749.jpg?v=1769385098"},{"product_id":"closely-observed-trains-by-bohumil-hrabal","title":"'Closely Observed Trains' by Bohumil Hrabal","description":"\u003ch4 data-start=\"49\" data-end=\"272\"\u003eA slim, razor-sharp novel set in a provincial railway station in Nazi-occupied Czechoslovakia.\u003c\/h4\u003e\n\u003cp data-start=\"274\" data-end=\"604\"\u003eHrabal follows Miloš Hrma, a young apprentice dispatcher more preoccupied with sexual failure than political resistance. Around him: eccentric stationmasters, rubber stamps, flirtations, gossip, and the slow choreography of trains arriving and departing under watchful eyes. The comedy is gentle, almost innocent — until it isn’t.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp data-start=\"606\" data-end=\"924\"\u003eIt is bawdy and tender, ridiculous and devastating. Hrabal writes with a kind of sideways lyricism, where desire sits next to death, farce next to occupation. Throughout it lets awkwardness, shame, and chance carry the weight of history.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp data-start=\"926\" data-end=\"955\"\u003eShort. Precise. Deeply human.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"bower studio","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":44062132535379,"sku":null,"price":9.0,"currency_code":"AUD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0689\/0268\/2707\/files\/ScholarsCreatingDigitalMapsofSpinoza_sEthics_5.png?v=1771289984"},{"product_id":"tunc-by-lawrence-durrell","title":"'Tunc' by Lawrence Durrell","description":"\u003ch4 data-start=\"168\" data-end=\"550\"\u003e\n\u003cem data-start=\"168\" data-end=\"174\"\u003eTunc\u003c\/em\u003e marks Lawrence Durrell’s turn from the lush eroticism of \u003cem data-start=\"232\" data-end=\"256\"\u003eThe Alexandria Quartet\u003c\/em\u003e toward something colder and more speculative, and honestly, more 'grubby' eroticism.\u003c\/h4\u003e\n\u003cp data-start=\"168\" data-end=\"550\"\u003eSet in a technologically ascendant Europe, it follows a man drawn into a shadowy corporate-religious nexus concerned with cybernetics, mysticism, and power. The novel sits at the uneasy meeting point of late modernism and early techno-paranoia.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp data-start=\"552\" data-end=\"956\"\u003eDurrell’s prose remains excessive, but here it presses against systems—capital, bureaucracy, spiritual hunger in an engineered world. Published in 1968, it anticipates later anxieties about technocracy and corporate transcendence without abandoning Durrell’s taste for metaphysical intrigue.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp data-start=\"552\" data-end=\"956\"\u003eIt is less beloved than the Quartet, but quite curious: a bridge between literary modernism and speculative unease.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"bower studio","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":44066532261971,"sku":null,"price":18.0,"currency_code":"AUD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0689\/0268\/2707\/files\/Untitleddesign-2026-02-19T164840.772.png?v=1771480131"},{"product_id":"written-on-the-body-by-jeanette-winterson","title":"'Written on the Body' by Jeanette Winterson","description":"\u003ch4 data-start=\"116\" data-end=\"174\"\u003eA love story told without revealing the narrator’s gender.\u003c\/h4\u003e\n\u003cp data-start=\"176\" data-end=\"482\"\u003e\u003cem data-start=\"176\" data-end=\"197\"\u003eWritten on the Body\u003c\/em\u003e follows an obsessive affair with a married woman. Winterson strips away biographical markers and focuses instead on language, anatomy, and attachment. The body becomes both metaphor and literal terrain.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp data-start=\"484\" data-end=\"618\"\u003eThe story is enmeshed in the idea of how love alters perception, how memory rewrites events, how devotion tips into fixation.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp data-start=\"620\" data-end=\"717\"\u003eFormally simple, emotionally sharp, and still unsettling.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"bower studio","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":44070585303123,"sku":null,"price":9.0,"currency_code":"AUD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0689\/0268\/2707\/files\/ScholarsCreatingDigitalMapsofSpinoza_sEthics_46.png?v=1771646879"},{"product_id":"caracole-by-edmund-white","title":"'Caracole' by Edmund White","description":"\u003cdiv class=\"flex flex-col text-sm pb-25\"\u003e\n\u003carticle class=\"text-token-text-primary w-full focus:outline-none [--shadow-height:45px] has-data-writing-block:pointer-events-none has-data-writing-block:-mt-(--shadow-height) has-data-writing-block:pt-(--shadow-height) [\u0026amp;:has([data-writing-block])\u0026gt;*]:pointer-events-auto scroll-mt-[calc(var(--header-height)+min(200px,max(70px,20svh)))]\" dir=\"auto\" data-turn-id=\"request-699d2b84-65d0-83a1-b478-e874c81c3d36-38\" data-testid=\"conversation-turn-106\" data-scroll-anchor=\"true\" data-turn=\"assistant\" tabindex=\"-1\"\u003e\n\u003cdiv class=\"text-base my-auto mx-auto pb-10 [--thread-content-margin:--spacing(4)] @w-sm\/main:[--thread-content-margin:--spacing(6)] @w-lg\/main:[--thread-content-margin:--spacing(16)] px-(--thread-content-margin)\"\u003e\n\u003cdiv class=\"[--thread-content-max-width:40rem] @w-lg\/main:[--thread-content-max-width:48rem] mx-auto max-w-(--thread-content-max-width) flex-1 group\/turn-messages focus-visible:outline-hidden relative flex w-full min-w-0 flex-col agent-turn\" tabindex=\"-1\"\u003e\n\u003cdiv class=\"flex max-w-full flex-col grow\"\u003e\n\u003cdiv data-message-author-role=\"assistant\" data-message-id=\"b6385052-b83b-42ad-91b9-09a5807f963b\" dir=\"auto\" data-message-model-slug=\"gpt-5-2\" class=\"min-h-8 text-message relative flex w-full flex-col items-end gap-2 text-start break-words whitespace-normal [.text-message+\u0026amp;]:mt-1\"\u003e\n\u003cdiv class=\"flex w-full flex-col gap-1 empty:hidden first:pt-[1px]\"\u003e\n\u003cdiv class=\"markdown prose dark:prose-invert w-full wrap-break-word light markdown-new-styling\"\u003e\n\u003ch4 data-start=\"29\" data-end=\"78\"\u003eA fevered, baroque, deliberately excessive novel.\u003c\/h4\u003e\n\u003cp data-start=\"80\" data-end=\"414\"\u003e\u003cem data-start=\"80\" data-end=\"90\"\u003eCaracole\u003c\/em\u003e follows Gabriel, a young man drifting through 19th-century Europe, seducing and being seduced, narrating his own mythology as he goes. The setting feels historical but the voice feels modern. The books is fuelled by its own appetite, mostly sexual, aesthetic, emotional. White leans into this to ornament the prose so it becomes an object that's as decadent as well as cruel. A Cruella De Vil of sorts. \u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp data-start=\"613\" data-end=\"786\"\u003eFor readers interested in queer historical fiction that refuses respectability, that prefers excess to apology. A novel that swirls rather than walks — appropriately titled.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp data-start=\"788\" data-end=\"844\" data-is-last-node=\"\" data-is-only-node=\"\"\u003e\u003cstrong\u003ePicador paperback. Light shelf wear consistent with age.\u003c\/strong\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003c\/div\u003e\n\u003c\/div\u003e\n\u003c\/div\u003e\n\u003c\/div\u003e\n\u003c\/div\u003e\n\u003c\/div\u003e\n\u003c\/article\u003e\n\u003c\/div\u003e","brand":"bower studio","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":44151909023827,"sku":null,"price":15.0,"currency_code":"AUD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0689\/0268\/2707\/files\/Untitleddesign-2026-02-25T100403.979.png?v=1772079191"},{"product_id":"masks-by-fumiko-enchi","title":"'Masks' by Fumiko Enchi","description":"\u003ch4 data-start=\"235\" data-end=\"653\"\u003eIn \u003cem data-start=\"238\" data-end=\"245\"\u003eMasks\u003c\/em\u003e, Fumiko Enchi draws on the aesthetics of classical Japanese Noh theatre to tell a modern story about power between men and women.\u003c\/h4\u003e\n\u003cp data-start=\"235\" data-end=\"653\"\u003eAt the centre of the novel is Mieko Togano, an elderly poet whose calm exterior conceals a patient, unsettling intelligence. Through subtle emotional manoeuvres, she begins orchestrating the relationships between her daughter-in-law and two male academics drawn into her orbit.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp data-start=\"655\" data-end=\"953\"\u003eEach character performs a role, concealing private motives behind social gestures — much like the masks of Noh drama that give the novel its title. Love, grief, jealousy, and vengeance move beneath the surface of polite conversation.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp data-start=\"1298\" data-end=\"1394\"\u003eElegant, unsettling, and psychologically sharp, \u003cem data-start=\"1346\" data-end=\"1353\"\u003eMasks\u003c\/em\u003e is one of Enchi’s most celebrated works.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"bower studio","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":44166918111315,"sku":null,"price":15.0,"currency_code":"AUD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0689\/0268\/2707\/files\/Untitleddesign-2026-03-04T101341.098.png?v=1772579637"},{"product_id":"the-three-marias-new-portuguese-letters-by-maria-isabel-barreno-maria-teresa-horta-and-maria-velho-da-costa","title":"'The Three Marias: New Portuguese Letters' by Maria Isabel Barreno, Maria Teresa Horta, and Maria Velho da Costa","description":"\u003ch4 data-start=\"320\" data-end=\"717\"\u003e\n\u003cem data-start=\"320\" data-end=\"344\"\u003eNew Portuguese Letters\u003c\/em\u003e, written collectively by the three authors who became known as “The Three Marias,” is one of the most radical literary works to emerge from late-twentieth-century Europe. Published in Portugal in 1972 during the final years of the Estado Novo dictatorship, the book immediately provoked scandal and censorship for its open treatment of sexuality, power, and women’s lives.\u003c\/h4\u003e\n\u003cp data-start=\"719\" data-end=\"1085\"\u003eThe text refuses conventional form. Letters, poems, essays, fragments, historical reflections, and imagined voices intertwine to create a polyphonic exploration of patriarchy, colonialism, and desire. The authors draw inspiration from the seventeenth-century \u003cem data-start=\"978\" data-end=\"1007\"\u003eLetters of a Portuguese Nun\u003c\/em\u003e, but transform that historical echo into a fiercely modern feminist critique.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp data-start=\"1087\" data-end=\"1432\"\u003eThe Portuguese government prosecuted the three writers for obscenity, triggering international protest and turning the book into a touchstone of the global feminist movement of the 1970s. What remains today is not just a political document but a formally daring work of literature that moves between lyric intensity and intellectual provocation.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"bower studio","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":44181965013075,"sku":null,"price":16.0,"currency_code":"AUD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0689\/0268\/2707\/files\/ScholarsCreatingDigitalMapsofSpinoza_sEthics-2026-03-11T191519.197.png?v=1773216992"},{"product_id":"death-in-the-sauna-by-dennis-altman","title":"'Death in the Sauna' by Dennis Altman","description":"\u003ch4 data-start=\"11\" data-end=\"563\"\u003e\n\u003cspan class=\"hover:entity-accent entity-underline inline cursor-pointer align-baseline\"\u003e\u003cspan class=\"whitespace-normal\"\u003eDennis Altman\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/span\u003e blends crime fiction with the social worlds he knows best: queer politics, academia, and international activism.\u003c\/h4\u003e\n\u003cp data-start=\"11\" data-end=\"563\"\u003eThe novel follows journalist and reluctant investigator Harry Laird as he becomes entangled in the suspicious death of a prominent Australian academic found in a Berlin sauna. What begins as an awkward inquiry soon stretches across cities and political circles, drawing Laird into networks of diplomats, scholars, and activists whose public ideals mask private contradictions.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp data-start=\"565\" data-end=\"966\"\u003eSet largely in Berlin, the novel moves between mystery and cultural satire. Altman uses the framework of a detective story to explore questions of power, sexuality, and reputation within global intellectual life. The result is a sly, literate crime novel that treats its setting and characters with equal parts affection and skepticism.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"bower studio","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":44185754632275,"sku":null,"price":16.0,"currency_code":"AUD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0689\/0268\/2707\/files\/ScholarsCreatingDigitalMapsofSpinoza_sEthics-2026-03-13T120306.186.png?v=1773363802"},{"product_id":"dracula-by-bram-stoker","title":"'Dracula' by Bram Stoker","description":"\u003ch4 data-start=\"163\" data-end=\"515\"\u003eOne of those books that’s been so absorbed into culture it almost disappears as a \u003cem data-start=\"245\" data-end=\"251\"\u003etext\u003c\/em\u003e.\u003c\/h4\u003e\n\u003cp data-start=\"163\" data-end=\"515\"\u003e\u003cem data-start=\"253\" data-end=\"262\"\u003eDracula\u003c\/em\u003e is less about the vampire himself than about systems trying—and failing—to contain something that doesn’t behave according to their rules. Diaries, letters, telegrams: the novel is structured as evidence, as if assembling a case against the irrational.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp data-start=\"517\" data-end=\"812\"\u003eWhat’s unsettling isn’t just Dracula, but how fragile the modern world looks when confronted with him. Science, medicine, religion—all present, all slightly inadequate. The novel sits right at that fault line between Victorian certainty and something older, less legible pushing back through it.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp data-start=\"814\" data-end=\"898\"\u003eIt’s readable, surprisingly procedural, and far colder than its reputation suggests.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"bower studio","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":44194165489747,"sku":null,"price":10.0,"currency_code":"AUD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0689\/0268\/2707\/files\/Untitleddesign-2026-03-17T191535.190.png?v=1773735406"},{"product_id":"slick-by-camarin-grae","title":"'Slick' by Camarin Grae","description":"\u003ch4 data-start=\"112\" data-end=\"601\"\u003eA lesbian conference in San Francisco is set to centre on the arrival of the Winged Dancer, a priceless golden statue loaned from South America.\u003c\/h4\u003e\n\u003cp data-start=\"112\" data-end=\"601\"\u003eDespite elaborate precautions, the statue is stolen en route by a woman calling herself Slick, who then begins taunting the organisers and investigators trying to recover it. The question quickly stops being just \u003cem data-start=\"509\" data-end=\"531\"\u003ewhere is the statue?\u003c\/em\u003e and becomes \u003cem data-start=\"544\" data-end=\"601\"\u003ewho is Slick, and what exactly is she trying to expose?\u003c\/em\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp data-start=\"603\" data-end=\"1070\"\u003e\u003cem data-start=\"722\" data-end=\"729\"\u003eSlick\u003c\/em\u003e moves through queer desire, performance, symbolism, and power, asking what happens when an object meant to stand for women is seized, hidden, and turned into a provocation. Published in 1990, it belongs to a sharper, less domesticated strain of queer fiction: politically charged, psychologically slippery, and resistant to neat resolution.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"bower studio","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":44195289399379,"sku":null,"price":10.0,"currency_code":"AUD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0689\/0268\/2707\/files\/Untitleddesign-2026-03-18T105713.153.png?v=1773791852"},{"product_id":"night-people-by-barry-gifford","title":"'Night People' by Barry Gifford","description":"\u003ch4\u003eCult.\u003c\/h4\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\u003cmeta charset=\"utf-8\"\u003eThis is Gifford in his scuzzy, neon-noir register: a chain of linked stories and drifters, killers, runaways, zealots, and damaged kids moving through a grotesque American South. \u003cspan\u003eWhen the murders start, it is up to one person to find out whether the murderer is a vampire.\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cspan\u003e \u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eThe book is one long richochet. Characters slide through one another’s stories, violence and absurdity keep changing shape, and the whole thing starts to feel like a panoramic map of national derangement rather than a conventional crime novel.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eContemporary reviews and publisher copy both frame it as connected stories or novellas rather than a single rigidly plotted narrative. Fun, good if you're getting into noir, or you're not into the airport crime fiction on offer but still want a good rollercoaster. \u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"bower studio","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":44259568287827,"sku":null,"price":14.0,"currency_code":"AUD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0689\/0268\/2707\/files\/Untitleddesign-2026-03-20T133019.541.png?v=1773973831"},{"product_id":"the-chantic-bird-by-david-ireland","title":"'The Chantic Bird' by David Ireland","description":"\u003ch4\u003e\n\u003cmeta charset=\"utf-8\"\u003e\n\u003cem data-start=\"297\" data-end=\"315\"\u003eThe Chantic Bird\u003c\/em\u003e is one of Ireland's harsher, stranger novels: a book of masculine decay, sexual unease, social grotesquerie, and moral corrosion.\u003c\/h4\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eIreland is very good at making ordinary Australian life feel spiritually rotten without ever becoming theatrical about it. The novel circles a damaged male consciousness and the humiliations, compulsions, and fantasies that accumulate around it; it’s abrasive, darkly comic, and not remotely interested in making itself pleasant.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eThat difficulty is part of the appeal, it sits well with readers who like postwar Australian fiction at its most ugly, intelligent, and unsentimental.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"bower studio","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":44259569958995,"sku":null,"price":14.0,"currency_code":"AUD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0689\/0268\/2707\/files\/Untitleddesign-2026-03-20T133850.945.png?v=1773974346"},{"product_id":"the-wind-up-bird-chronicle-by-haruki-murakami","title":"'The Wind-Up Bird Chronicle' by Haruki Murakami","description":"\u003ch4 data-start=\"1341\" data-end=\"1842\"\u003eMurakami’s sprawling breakout novel begins with a missing cat and a drifting marriage, then opens into something much larger and stranger: war memory, psychic descent, sexual obsession, bureaucratic emptiness, violence, dream logic, everything.\u003c\/h4\u003e\n\u003cp data-start=\"1341\" data-end=\"1842\"\u003eToru Okada, a man almost comically passive, is pulled into a widening system of disappearances, testimonies, wells, and parallel realities. It’s one of Murakami’s best examples of making the mundane feel cosmically unstable. It's before he got commercialised, there's a lot more grit in here.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp data-start=\"1005\" data-end=\"1438\"\u003eOriginally published in Japanese in the mid-1990s and translated into English by Jay Rubin, this is one of Murakami’s major works: sprawling, hypnotic, disturbing, and much darker than the soft-focus “lonely man makes pasta” version of his reputation sometimes suggests. It is part detective story, part war novel, part metaphysical excavation, interested in what violence does when it is buried inside ordinary life and left to hum.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cdiv class=\"qMYqUG_convSearchResultHighlightRoot\"\u003e\n\u003cdiv class=\"\" data-turn-id-container=\"request-6a13ebf1-e3bc-83ec-8e04-eb5854921a4e-9\" data-is-intersecting=\"true\"\u003e\n\u003csection class=\"text-token-text-primary w-full focus:outline-none has-data-writing-block:pointer-events-none [\u0026amp;:has([data-writing-block])\u0026gt;*]:pointer-events-auto R6Vx5W_threadScrollVars scroll-mb-[calc(var(--scroll-root-safe-area-inset-bottom,0px)+var(--thread-response-height))] scroll-mt-[calc(var(--header-height)+min(200px,max(70px,20svh)))]\" dir=\"auto\" data-turn-id=\"request-6a13ebf1-e3bc-83ec-8e04-eb5854921a4e-9\" data-turn-id-container=\"request-6a13ebf1-e3bc-83ec-8e04-eb5854921a4e-9\" data-testid=\"conversation-turn-56\" data-scroll-anchor=\"false\" data-turn=\"assistant\"\u003e\n\u003cdiv class=\"text-base my-auto mx-auto pb-10 [--thread-content-margin:var(--thread-content-margin-xs,calc(var(--spacing)*4))] @w-sm\/main:[--thread-content-margin:var(--thread-content-margin-sm,calc(var(--spacing)*6))] @w-lg\/main:[--thread-content-margin:var(--thread-content-margin-lg,calc(var(--spacing)*16))] px-(--thread-content-margin)\"\u003e\n\u003cdiv class=\"[--thread-content-max-width:40rem] @w-lg\/main:[--thread-content-max-width:48rem] mx-auto max-w-(--thread-content-max-width) flex-1 group\/turn-messages focus-visible:outline-hidden relative flex w-full min-w-0 flex-col agent-turn\"\u003e\n\u003cdiv class=\"flex max-w-full flex-col gap-4 grow\"\u003e\n\u003cdiv data-message-author-role=\"assistant\" data-message-id=\"52dd4cc8-7676-4da6-a112-39b303a91543\" dir=\"auto\" data-message-model-slug=\"gpt-5-5-thinking\" class=\"min-h-8 text-message relative flex w-full flex-col items-end gap-2 text-start break-words whitespace-normal outline-none keyboard-focused:focus-ring [.text-message+\u0026amp;]:mt-1\" data-turn-start-message=\"true\" tabindex=\"0\"\u003e\n\u003cdiv class=\"flex w-full flex-col gap-1 empty:hidden\"\u003e\n\u003cdiv class=\"markdown prose dark:prose-invert wrap-break-word w-full light markdown-new-styling\"\u003e\n\u003cp data-start=\"1728\" data-end=\"2174\" data-is-last-node=\"\" data-is-only-node=\"\"\u003e\u003cstrong\u003ePanther paperback edition, first published in this form by The Harvill Press in 1999. Translated from the Japanese by Jay Rubin. General reading wear to cover and edges, with creasing to front cover\/spine area and bumped corners; internally readable and intact. Good solid reading copy of a desirable Murakami title.\u003c\/strong\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003c\/div\u003e\n\u003c\/div\u003e\n\u003c\/div\u003e\n\u003c\/div\u003e\n\u003c\/div\u003e\n\u003c\/div\u003e\n\u003c\/section\u003e\n\u003c\/div\u003e\n\u003c\/div\u003e","brand":"bower studio","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":44259637362771,"sku":null,"price":15.0,"currency_code":"AUD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0689\/0268\/2707\/files\/Yourparagraphtext-2026-05-26T110021.039.png?v=1779757256"},{"product_id":"foam-of-the-daze-l-ecume-des-jours-by-boris-vian","title":"'Foam of the Daze (L’Écume des jours)' by Boris Vian","description":"\u003ch4 data-start=\"145\" data-end=\"699\"\u003e\n\u003cmeta charset=\"utf-8\"\u003eThis is one of those mid-century French novels that keeps escaping its own era because it feels handmade out of style, grief, jazz, absurdity, and class disgust.\u003c\/h4\u003e\n\u003cp data-start=\"145\" data-end=\"699\"\u003eVian’s cult novel is a love story, a satire, and a surreal machine all at once. Colin, wealthy and guileless, falls in love with Chloé; around them the world behaves according to emotional rather than physical law. Rooms shrink, objects develop moods, a piano can generate cocktails, and a water lily begins growing in Chloé’s lung. The book starts in bright, playful invention and gradually curdles into something sadder and more claustrophobic, which is exactly where its force lies. It is whimsical in the old dangerous sense — not cute, but unstable.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp data-start=\"701\" data-end=\"1100\"\u003eIt sits somewhere between pataphysics, romance, anti-bourgeois fantasy, and tragic farce. Cult-literary status, translated fiction interest, and a strong object presence in this edition.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp data-start=\"701\" data-end=\"1100\"\u003e\u003cmeta charset=\"utf-8\"\u003eTamTam Books paperback, \u003cstrong data-start=\"83\" data-end=\"114\"\u003efirst US edition thus, 2003\u003c\/strong\u003e, translated by Brian Harper.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"bower studio","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":44267871010899,"sku":null,"price":21.0,"currency_code":"AUD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0689\/0268\/2707\/files\/Untitleddesign-2026-03-22T163225.965.png?v=1774157564"},{"product_id":"derisions-et-vertige-trouvures-by-jean-senac-french","title":"'Dérisions et Vertige: trouvures' by Jean Sénac (French)","description":"\u003ch4 data-start=\"731\" data-end=\"1090\"\u003eJean Sénac’s poetry sits at a charged crossroads: French and Algerian, erotic and political, intimate and insurgent.\u003c\/h4\u003e\n\u003cp data-start=\"731\" data-end=\"1090\"\u003e\u003cem data-start=\"861\" data-end=\"883\"\u003eDérisions et Vertige\u003c\/em\u003e belongs to the later arc of his work, where lyric intensity and formal sharpness meet a life lived in public fracture — decolonisation, exile, desire, language, nationhood, all pressing against one another.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp data-start=\"1092\" data-end=\"1439\"\u003eThis is not polite poetry, nor safely museum-kept francophone verse. Sénac writes with heat, abrasion, and tenderness, trying to make a language equal to contradiction: beauty without innocence, identity without purity, love without shelter. A serious copy for readers of twentieth-century poetry who like their literature lit from inside by risk. \u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\u003cstrong\u003e\u003cspan data-start=\"86\" data-end=\"133\"\u003eF\u003c\/span\u003erench-language Actes Sud edition from 1983. Some marginalia in black ink pen, otherwise in great condition.\u003c\/strong\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"bower studio","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":44271342944339,"sku":null,"price":16.0,"currency_code":"AUD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0689\/0268\/2707\/files\/Untitleddesign-2026-03-24T154552.408.png?v=1774327723"},{"product_id":"moderato-cantabile-by-marguerite-duras-french","title":"'Moderato Cantabile' by Marguerite Duras (French)","description":"\u003cp\u003e\u003cstrong\u003eTeach yourself a little French with Duras.\u003c\/strong\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\u003cspan style=\"font-family: -apple-system, BlinkMacSystemFont, 'San Francisco', 'Segoe UI', Roboto, 'Helvetica Neue', sans-serif; font-size: 0.875rem;\"\u003eOne of Duras’s sharpest and strangest early novels, \u003c\/span\u003e\u003cem data-start=\"959\" data-end=\"979\" style=\"font-family: -apple-system, BlinkMacSystemFont, 'San Francisco', 'Segoe UI', Roboto, 'Helvetica Neue', sans-serif; font-size: 0.875rem;\"\u003eModerato Cantabile\u003c\/em\u003e\u003cspan style=\"font-family: -apple-system, BlinkMacSystemFont, 'San Francisco', 'Segoe UI', Roboto, 'Helvetica Neue', sans-serif; font-size: 0.875rem;\"\u003e begins with a murder overheard during a child’s piano lesson and then drifts into obsession, repetition, and desire. A wealthy woman returns again and again to the café where the killing took place, circling the event with a former factory worker as though language itself might become a form of seduction.\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp data-start=\"1288\" data-end=\"1550\"\u003eIt is a small, exacting book, but not a slight one. Duras pares everything back — plot, gesture, explanation — until class tension, erotic projection, and social performance begin to hum inside the silence. More incantation than drama, and all the better for it.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\u003cmeta charset=\"utf-8\"\u003e\u003cstrong\u003eFrench paperback in the Les Éditions de Minuit “Double”, 1958. Original publication date of 1957. Great condition for a 70 year old book.\u003c\/strong\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"bower studio","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":44273857069139,"sku":null,"price":9.0,"currency_code":"AUD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0689\/0268\/2707\/files\/Untitleddesign-2026-03-25T090406.762.png?v=1774389862"},{"product_id":"universal-love-by-alexander-weinstein","title":"'Universal Love' by Alexander Weinstein","description":"\u003ch4 data-end=\"1093\" data-start=\"767\"\u003e\n\u003cmeta charset=\"utf-8\"\u003eWritten across near-future and slightly altered worlds where intimacy is shaped by technology, grief, fantasy, loneliness, and desire — but never reduced to concept alone.\u003c\/h4\u003e\n\u003cp data-end=\"1093\" data-start=\"767\"\u003eThese are stories about people trying, often awkwardly and sometimes desperately, to reach one another: through memory, through simulation, through bodies, through the wreckage of ordinary feeling. The speculative edge is there, but lightly handled; what stays in the hand is the emotional atmosphere, the oddness of modern attachment, and the sense that love now arrives tangled up with distance, mediation, and invention.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp data-end=\"1781\" data-start=\"1520\"\u003eGood for readers who like literary short fiction with a speculative tilt — Jenny Offill-adjacent in sensibility, though softer and more romantic in places — or for anyone interested in stories where emotional sincerity and weirdness are allowed to share a room.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp data-end=\"1781\" data-start=\"1520\"\u003e\u003cmeta charset=\"utf-8\"\u003e\u003cstrong\u003ePaperback in very good condition. This edition published by The Text Publishing Company in 2020. Printed and bound in Australia.\u003c\/strong\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"bower studio","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":44278878273619,"sku":null,"price":15.0,"currency_code":"AUD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0689\/0268\/2707\/files\/Untitled_design_-_2026-03-27T125109.460.png?v=1774576284"},{"product_id":"a-certain-smile-lost-profile-both-by-francoise-sagan","title":"'A Certain Smile \u0026 Lost Profile' both by Françoise Sagan","description":"\u003ch4 data-start=\"445\" data-end=\"558\"\u003eTwo slim novels full of glamour, restlessness, and emotional misbehaviour. Sold as a pair.\u003c\/h4\u003e\n\u003cp data-start=\"560\" data-end=\"943\"\u003eIn \u003cem data-start=\"563\" data-end=\"580\"\u003eA Certain Smile\u003c\/em\u003e, a young Parisian student drifts into an affair with an older married man, and Sagan turns what could have been a simple scandal into something cooler, sadder, and much more exacting. It is one of her cleanest books about youth, boredom, vanity, and the way desire can make people feel both more alive and less real. \u003cspan class=\"\" data-state=\"closed\"\u003e\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp data-start=\"945\" data-end=\"1370\"\u003e\u003cem data-start=\"945\" data-end=\"959\"\u003eLost Profile\u003c\/em\u003e is later Sagan, and a little darker: a novel of money, dependence, escape, and the uneasy bargains people make with one another in order to be rescued, or merely rearranged. Together they show both ends of her gift — the early icy brilliance and the later, more bruised sophistication — without losing that unmistakable Sagan atmosphere of luxury, drift, and damage. \u003cspan class=\"\" data-state=\"closed\"\u003e\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\u003cmeta charset=\"utf-8\"\u003e\u003cstrong\u003eVintage Penguin paperbacks by Françoise Sagan. \u003cem data-start=\"115\" data-end=\"129\"\u003eLost Profile\u003c\/em\u003e is the 1978 Penguin paperback, from Joanna Kilmartin’s English translation first published in 1976, \u003cem data-start=\"288\" data-end=\"305\"\u003eA Certain Smile\u003c\/em\u003e is a Penguin paperback reprint from 1975, from the English translation first published in 1956. Both in acceptable condition, reading copies and bring to the beach for sure.\u003c\/strong\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"bower studio","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":44283060453459,"sku":null,"price":12.0,"currency_code":"AUD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0689\/0268\/2707\/files\/Untitleddesign-2026-03-29T111749.142.png?v=1774743484"},{"product_id":"spy-in-the-house-of-love-by-anais-nin","title":"'a spy in the house of love' by Anaïs Nin","description":"\u003ch4 data-start=\"344\" data-end=\"687\"\u003eOne of Anaïs Nin’s central novels, \u003cem data-start=\"391\" data-end=\"419\"\u003eA Spy in the House of Love\u003c\/em\u003e follows Sabina, a woman moving through marriage, affairs, fantasy, performance, and confession with equal parts hunger and dread. \u003c\/h4\u003e\n\u003cp data-start=\"689\" data-end=\"1199\"\u003eWhat makes the book last is that Nin doesn’t treat erotic life as scandal or ornament. She treats it as atmosphere, method, self-invention, and danger. Sabina’s restlessness is sexual, obviously, but also artistic and metaphysical; she wants intensity without surrender, freedom without consequence, and the novel knows that bargain never holds. Strange, elegant, feverish, and unusually interior, it sits somewhere between confession, modernist dream, and erotic novella.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\u003cmeta charset=\"utf-8\"\u003e\u003cstrong\u003ePeter Owen, London. First British Commonwealth edition, 1971. \u003c\/strong\u003e\u003cstrong\u003eHardback with illustrations by Ian Hugo. \u003c\/strong\u003e\u003cstrong\u003eOriginally published in 1954; this Peter Owen edition carries a later Commonwealth first statement. \u003cmeta charset=\"utf-8\"\u003eGood condition dust jacket, great condition inside. \u003c\/strong\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"bower studio","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":44283077623891,"sku":null,"price":55.0,"currency_code":"AUD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0689\/0268\/2707\/files\/Untitleddesign-2026-03-29T113856.584.png?v=1774744752"},{"product_id":"monkeys-mask-by-dorothy-porter","title":"'Monkey's Mask' by Dorothy Porter","description":"\u003ch4 data-start=\"876\" data-end=\"1327\"\u003e\n\u003cmeta charset=\"utf-8\"\u003eStill one of the strangest and most successful crossover books in contemporary Australian writing.\u003c\/h4\u003e\n\u003cp data-start=\"876\" data-end=\"1327\"\u003ePart detective novel, part lesbian noir, part poetry sequence, it follows private investigator Jill Fitzpatrick as she takes on the case of a missing young woman and gets pulled into a world of obsession, sex, performance, and violence. Porter writes the whole thing in verse, but it moves with the momentum of a thriller — sharp, dirty, funny, and unnervingly elegant.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp data-start=\"1329\" data-end=\"1693\"\u003eThe poetry is not decorative; it is the engine. Porter takes noir’s usual machinery — desire, risk, glamour, corruption — and rewires it through a specifically Australian, specifically queer sensibility. \u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp data-start=\"1329\" data-end=\"1693\"\u003e\u003cmeta charset=\"utf-8\"\u003e\u003cstrong\u003eHyland House, South Melbourne, first edition, 1994; this copy is the 1994 reprint. Paperback original. An early signed Australian copy of Porter’s breakthrough verse novel. The book won the Age Book of the Year for Poetry in 1994, along with the National Book Council Award for Poetry and Braille Book of the Year. In great condition.\u003c\/strong\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"bower studio","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":44325192564819,"sku":null,"price":95.0,"currency_code":"AUD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0689\/0268\/2707\/files\/Untitleddesign-2026-03-30T165216.906.png?v=1774849957"},{"product_id":"asylum-road-by-olivia-sudjic","title":"'Asylum Road' by Olivia Sudjic","description":"\u003ch4 data-start=\"0\" data-end=\"414\"\u003eSudjić’s debut moves with slinked, accumulating dread. \u003c\/h4\u003e\n\u003cp data-start=\"0\" data-end=\"414\"\u003eAnja, a young woman searching for her missing father while navigating a relationship that becomes increasingly erratic. The novel tracks control, dependency, and the slow erosion of certainty—what begins as concern turns into something harder to name, with the external search folding into a more internal disorientation.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp data-start=\"416\" data-end=\"719\"\u003eKey events are often implied rather than staged outright, familiar (but by no means lost in the crowd) in a wave of psychologically acute, minimalist fiction, but there’s enough emotional ambiguity here to keep it unsettled.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp data-start=\"416\" data-end=\"719\"\u003e\u003cmeta charset=\"utf-8\"\u003e\u003cstrong\u003eBloomsbury paperback, 2021 (first edition, third printing). Very good copy with light general wear; minor handling marks to covers, internally clean.\u003c\/strong\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"bower studio","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":44367851749459,"sku":null,"price":15.0,"currency_code":"AUD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0689\/0268\/2707\/files\/Untitleddesign-2026-04-04T115922.840.png?v=1775264376"},{"product_id":"cleanness-by-garth-greenwell","title":"'Cleanness' by Garth Greenwell","description":"\u003ch4\u003e\n\u003cmeta charset=\"utf-8\"\u003e\n\u003cem data-start=\"40\" data-end=\"51\"\u003eCleanness\u003c\/em\u003e is structured as a series of interlinked stories following an unnamed American teacher living in Sofia, Bulgaria, moving through encounters that are at once erotic, transactional, yet tender.\u003c\/h4\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eThe novel is one made up of many moments of intimacy, power imbalance, misunderstanding—where language, class, and desire continually misalign. The title gestures toward a kind of moral or emotional clarity that never quite arrives; instead, the book sits in the ambiguity of connection, especially queer connection shaped by economics, geography, and the residue of post-socialist life.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eWhat’s striking is the precision of attention—sex is neither sensationalised nor abstracted, but rendered as a site where vulnerability and negotiation coexist in real time.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\u003cstrong\u003eThis is the 2021 Picador paperback (first UK edition 2020), in good condition with light shelf wear and some minor surface marking to the cover, otherwise clean throughout.\u003c\/strong\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"bower studio","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":44368270753875,"sku":null,"price":16.0,"currency_code":"AUD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0689\/0268\/2707\/files\/Untitleddesign-2026-04-04T134918.940.png?v=1775270983"},{"product_id":"story-of-the-eye-by-georges-bataille","title":"'Story of the Eye' by Georges Bataille","description":"\u003cp\u003eBataille’s short, notorious novel, made up of an obsessive circulation of images (the eye, the egg, the sun) pushed through sex, violence, and sacrilege until they begin to collapse into one another.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eWritten under a pseudonym in 1928 and long treated as illicit or marginal, \u003cem data-start=\"318\" data-end=\"336\" data-is-only-node=\"\"\u003eStory of the Eye\u003c\/em\u003e now sits more clearly as a key text in Bataille’s wider project: an attempt to locate experience at its limit, where desire becomes indistinguishable from transgression, and meaning breaks under pressure.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eIt’s not erotic in any conventional sense; it’s closer to a philosophical experiment conducted through the body.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\u003cmeta charset=\"utf-8\"\u003e\u003cstrong\u003ePenguin Modern Classics paperback edition (reprint; exact printing unspecified). Clean, presentable copy with light general wear; no major faults visible.\u003c\/strong\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"bower studio","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":44398159757395,"sku":null,"price":15.0,"currency_code":"AUD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0689\/0268\/2707\/files\/Untitleddesign-2026-04-05T153913.394.png?v=1775367678"},{"product_id":"a-decadent-woman-by-georges-de-peyrebrune","title":"'A Decadent Woman' by Georges de Peyrebrune","description":"\u003ch4 data-start=\"0\" data-end=\"419\"\u003eA late-19th-century French novel of decadence and social drift, centred on a woman whose refusal—or inability—to align with conventional expectations becomes both her defining trait and her undoing.\u003c\/h4\u003e\n\u003cp data-start=\"0\" data-end=\"419\"\u003ePeyrebrune traces her movements through a series of encounters that expose the constraints placed on female autonomy, desire, and reputation, without ever fully stabilising her as either victim or transgressor.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp data-start=\"421\" data-end=\"966\"\u003eGeorges de Peyrebrune—the pen name of Mathilde-Marie Georgina Élisabeth de Peyrebrune—was a prolific French writer associated with naturalist and realist circles, though her work often sits slightly outside them. Writing at a time when women’s authorship was both visible and constrained, she frequently returned to questions of female independence, social judgment, and the limits imposed on women’s lives. Much of her work fell out of circulation in the 20th century and has only recently been recovered through small press reissues like Snuggly.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp data-start=\"421\" data-end=\"966\"\u003e\u003cstrong\u003e\u003cmeta charset=\"utf-8\"\u003eSnuggly Books paperback edition, 2021, translated and introduced by Brian Stableford. Clean copy with minor cover wear. \u003c\/strong\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"bower studio","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":44409400426579,"sku":null,"price":18.0,"currency_code":"AUD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0689\/0268\/2707\/files\/Untitleddesign-2026-04-06T120251.524.png?v=1775441335"},{"product_id":"second-place-by-rachel-cusk","title":"'Second Place' by Rachel Cusk","description":"\u003ch4 data-start=\"595\" data-end=\"1012\"\u003eA woman arrives at a coastal house owned by a famous artist, invited—or perhaps drawn—into a situation that quickly reveals itself as unstable.\u003c\/h4\u003e\n\u003cp data-start=\"595\" data-end=\"1012\"\u003eAround her: the artist, his volatile partner, and the uneasy triangulation of attention, control, and interpretation. What unfolds isn’t quite plot so much as a series of shifting positions—who is observing, who is being shaped, and who gets to decide what any of it means.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp data-start=\"1014\" data-end=\"1392\"\u003ePublished in 2021, \u003cem data-start=\"1033\" data-end=\"1047\"\u003eSecond Place\u003c\/em\u003e continues \u003cspan class=\"hover:entity-accent entity-underline inline cursor-pointer align-baseline\"\u003e\u003cspan class=\"whitespace-normal\"\u003eRachel Cusk\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/span\u003e’s move away from conventional narrative into something cooler and more interrogative. Loosely inspired by Mabel Dodge Luhan’s memoir \u003cem data-start=\"1229\" data-end=\"1246\"\u003eLorenzo in Taos\u003c\/em\u003e, the novel reworks that dynamic—artist and patron, host and intruder—into a study of authority, authorship, and the subtle violence of being seen.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp data-start=\"1907\" data-end=\"1937\"\u003e\u003cstrong\u003eFaber \u0026amp; Faber paperback, 2021. Very good condition: light shelf wear only; clean covers with minimal signs of handling; binding firm; pages clean and unmarked.\u003c\/strong\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"bower studio","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":44493221724243,"sku":null,"price":19.0,"currency_code":"AUD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0689\/0268\/2707\/files\/Untitleddesign-2026-04-14T163130.592.png?v=1776148301"},{"product_id":"black-novel-with-argentines-by-luisa-valenzuela","title":"'Black Novel (with Argentines)' by Luisa Valenzuela","description":"\u003ch4 data-start=\"417\" data-end=\"882\"\u003eLuisa Valenzuela is one of the sharpest Argentine writers of the late twentieth century, and \u003cem data-start=\"510\" data-end=\"541\"\u003eBlack Novel (with Argentines)\u003c\/em\u003e works like a crime story that has already burst its own container.\u003c\/h4\u003e\n\u003cp data-start=\"417\" data-end=\"882\"\u003eTwo Argentine writers arrive in New York, one of them apparently having committed a senseless murder, and what follows is a feverish drift through guilt, performance, exile, erotic obsession.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp data-start=\"884\" data-end=\"1392\"\u003eThe “black novel” of the title is both noir form and dark state condition: Valenzuela is writing in the long shadow of Argentina’s dictatorship, disappearances, censorship, and political violence, she lets it infect the novel’s structure. Identity slips, motives distort, language performs tricks, and the city becomes a stage for panic, desire, and self-invention. It is witty, cerebral, and increasingly deranged in exactly the right way.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp data-start=\"1727\" data-end=\"1826\"\u003e\u003cstrong\u003eFirst English-language edition, Simon \u0026amp; Schuster, 1992. Translated from the Spanish by Toby Talbot. Hardback in very good condition overall. Light general shelf wear to jacket, with minor rubbing and edge wear; boards sound; interior clean; binding firm.\u003c\/strong\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"bower studio","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":44494481391699,"sku":null,"price":28.0,"currency_code":"AUD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0689\/0268\/2707\/files\/Untitleddesign-2026-04-14T212302.660.png?v=1776165799"},{"product_id":"the-fifth-son-by-elie-wiesel","title":"'The Fifth Son' by Elie Wiesel","description":"\u003ch4 data-start=\"217\" data-end=\"525\"\u003eReuven Tamiroff, a Holocaust survivor, has never spoken of his past; his son, coming of age in the unrest of the Sixties, begins to look elsewhere to find it.\u003c\/h4\u003e\n\u003cp data-start=\"217\" data-end=\"525\"\u003eAs he searches deep within his father’s circle, he finds disturbances; a killing, carried out in the shadow of liberation. A man thought dead who may not be. The past, not sealed but deferred.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp data-start=\"705\" data-end=\"932\"\u003eWiesel has written more than fifty books, and they all seem to have an individuality about them that makes them hit you right in the core. This book is a question of generational inheritance, finding out what you truly are made up of so you can begin to live. \u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp data-start=\"1063\" data-end=\"1104\"\u003e\u003cstrong\u003ePenguin paperback edition (1987 reprint). Fair to good condition. Noticeable creasing and edge wear to covers, with rubbing and small chips at corners; spine worn but intact. Binding holds; interior clean and readable.\u003c\/strong\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"bower studio","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":44507018625107,"sku":null,"price":10.0,"currency_code":"AUD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0689\/0268\/2707\/files\/Untitleddesign-2026-04-19T115229.786.png?v=1776563579"},{"product_id":"pure-hollywood-by-christine-schutt","title":"'Pure Hollywood' by Christine Schutt","description":"\u003ch4 data-end=\"1011\" data-start=\"140\"\u003e\n\u003cmeta charset=\"utf-8\"\u003eNo dreamy-Hollywood shimmer, more rot under upholstery and people loving each other badly in high definition.\u003c\/h4\u003e\n\u003cp data-end=\"1011\" data-start=\"140\"\u003eAn alcoholic widowed actress withdraws to the desert, a young mother’s rejection of her child, a newlywed couple ignore the warnings of a painter scorched by love, and elsewhere Schutt tracks erotic fixation, familial damage, longing, spite and whips them together in these pieces that bite you back.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp data-end=\"1011\" data-start=\"140\"\u003eThe pleasure here is not big plot machinery but how cleanly and unnervingly Schutt cuts into dependency, desire, and emotional distortion. Sharp, cold, often very funny in a dark way, and written with that rare precision understands domestic scenes are always faintly dangerous.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp data-end=\"1011\" data-start=\"140\"\u003e\u003cstrong\u003eAnd Other Stories paperback, 2018. Very good condition, clean throughout with light shelfwear only.\u003c\/strong\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"bower studio","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":44507155464275,"sku":null,"price":17.0,"currency_code":"AUD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0689\/0268\/2707\/files\/Untitleddesign-2026-04-19T133447.793.png?v=1776569804"},{"product_id":"caracole-by-edmund-white-copy","title":"'Caracole' by Edmund White","description":"\u003cdiv class=\"flex flex-col text-sm pb-25\"\u003e\n\u003carticle class=\"text-token-text-primary w-full focus:outline-none [--shadow-height:45px] has-data-writing-block:pointer-events-none has-data-writing-block:-mt-(--shadow-height) has-data-writing-block:pt-(--shadow-height) [\u0026amp;:has([data-writing-block])\u0026gt;*]:pointer-events-auto scroll-mt-[calc(var(--header-height)+min(200px,max(70px,20svh)))]\" dir=\"auto\" data-turn-id=\"request-699d2b84-65d0-83a1-b478-e874c81c3d36-38\" data-testid=\"conversation-turn-106\" data-scroll-anchor=\"true\" data-turn=\"assistant\" tabindex=\"-1\"\u003e\n\u003cdiv class=\"text-base my-auto mx-auto pb-10 [--thread-content-margin:--spacing(4)] @w-sm\/main:[--thread-content-margin:--spacing(6)] @w-lg\/main:[--thread-content-margin:--spacing(16)] px-(--thread-content-margin)\"\u003e\n\u003cdiv class=\"[--thread-content-max-width:40rem] @w-lg\/main:[--thread-content-max-width:48rem] mx-auto max-w-(--thread-content-max-width) flex-1 group\/turn-messages focus-visible:outline-hidden relative flex w-full min-w-0 flex-col agent-turn\" tabindex=\"-1\"\u003e\n\u003cdiv class=\"flex max-w-full flex-col grow\"\u003e\n\u003cdiv data-message-author-role=\"assistant\" data-message-id=\"b6385052-b83b-42ad-91b9-09a5807f963b\" dir=\"auto\" data-message-model-slug=\"gpt-5-2\" class=\"min-h-8 text-message relative flex w-full flex-col items-end gap-2 text-start break-words whitespace-normal [.text-message+\u0026amp;]:mt-1\"\u003e\n\u003cdiv class=\"flex w-full flex-col gap-1 empty:hidden first:pt-[1px]\"\u003e\n\u003cdiv class=\"markdown prose dark:prose-invert w-full wrap-break-word light markdown-new-styling\"\u003e\n\u003ch4 data-start=\"29\" data-end=\"78\"\u003eA fevered, baroque, deliberately excessive novel.\u003c\/h4\u003e\n\u003cp data-start=\"80\" data-end=\"414\"\u003e\u003cem data-start=\"80\" data-end=\"90\"\u003eCaracole\u003c\/em\u003e follows Gabriel, a young man drifting through 19th-century Europe, seducing and being seduced, narrating his own mythology as he goes. The setting feels historical but the voice feels modern. The books is fuelled by its own appetite, mostly sexual, aesthetic, emotional. White leans into this to ornament the prose so it becomes an object that's as decadent as well as cruel. A Cruella De Vil of sorts. \u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp data-start=\"613\" data-end=\"786\"\u003eFor readers interested in queer historical fiction that refuses respectability, that prefers excess to apology. A novel that swirls rather than walks — appropriately titled.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp data-start=\"788\" data-end=\"844\" data-is-last-node=\"\" data-is-only-node=\"\"\u003e\u003cstrong\u003e\u003cmeta charset=\"utf-8\"\u003e\n\u003cspan\u003eHardcover first edition. Very good condition all round with some minor toning on the edges of pages. \u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/strong\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003c\/div\u003e\n\u003c\/div\u003e\n\u003c\/div\u003e\n\u003c\/div\u003e\n\u003c\/div\u003e\n\u003c\/div\u003e\n\u003c\/article\u003e\n\u003c\/div\u003e","brand":"bower studio","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":44555814961235,"sku":null,"price":25.0,"currency_code":"AUD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0689\/0268\/2707\/files\/Yourparagraphtext_38.png?v=1777608544"},{"product_id":"atomised-by-michel-houellebecq","title":"'Atomised' by Michel Houellebecq","description":"\u003ch4 data-start=\"0\" data-end=\"484\"\u003eMichel Houellebecq’s \u003cem data-start=\"21\" data-end=\"31\"\u003eAtomised\u003c\/em\u003e remains one of the defining novels of late-twentieth-century alienation.\u003c\/h4\u003e\n\u003cp data-start=\"0\" data-end=\"484\"\u003eThe novel is a cold, obscene, strangely tender autopsy of Western individualism at the point where sexual liberation, consumer capitalism, loneliness, and scientific rationalism collapse into each other. Through the lives of two half-brothers — one emotionally paralysed, the other sexually obsessive — Houellebecq maps a society that has mistaken freedom for meaning and desire for intimacy.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp data-start=\"0\" data-end=\"484\"\u003eIt is ugly, funny, philosophical, vulgar, despairing, reactionary, insightful, and emotionally sincere all at once. Houellebecq writes as if social shittiness has collapsed culture entirely, and everyone simply kept going to work afterward.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp data-start=\"0\" data-end=\"484\"\u003e\u003cstrong\u003eVintage paperback edition, 2001, translated by Frank Wynne. Early English-language Vintage printing of \u003cem data-start=\"945\" data-end=\"974\"\u003eLes Particules élémentaires\u003c\/em\u003e. Light shelf wear and handling marks to wraps, with some edge rubbing; interior clean and binding firm. A solid reading copy.\u003c\/strong\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"bower studio","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":44570336395347,"sku":null,"price":16.0,"currency_code":"AUD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0689\/0268\/2707\/files\/Yourparagraphtext_68.png?v=1778050333"},{"product_id":"the-one-sky-day-by-leone-ross","title":"'The One Sky Day' by Leone Ross","description":"\u003ch4 data-start=\"38\" data-end=\"618\"\u003eLeone Ross’ \u003cem data-start=\"50\" data-end=\"68\"\u003eThis One Sky Day\u003c\/em\u003e is one of those novels that feels almost physically overgrown.\u003c\/h4\u003e\n\u003cp data-start=\"38\" data-end=\"618\"\u003eSet on the fictional Caribbean archipelago of Popisho, the book folds together mythology, eroticism, politics, ecology, gossip, weather, grief, food, memory and magic into something dense enough to feel humid. Everyone on the island possesses a particular gift or strangeness; sesire alters weather systems, shame leaks into the body. The landscape itself seems sentient and reactive.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp data-start=\"620\" data-end=\"1068\"\u003eRoss writes with extraordinary attention to appetite, colour, movement and bodily presence, but underneath all the lushness is a novel deeply concerned with inheritance, violence, colonial residue, class and emotional concealment. The island operates almost like a nervous system. Everybody touches everybody else’s weather eventually.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp data-start=\"1070\" data-end=\"1378\"\u003eIt also sits in an interesting lineage beside writers like Marlon James, Helen Oyeyemi, Toni Morrison, Gabriel García Márquez and Karen Lord, while remaining stylistically very much its own thing. Strange, excessive, funny, erotic, occasionally grotesque. A book that trusts abundance rather than minimalism.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp data-start=\"1070\" data-end=\"1378\"\u003e\u003cstrong\u003e2021 Faber export paperback edition. Later printing. Appears in very good condition from photos, with minimal shelf wear.\u003c\/strong\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"bower studio","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":44570608762963,"sku":null,"price":18.0,"currency_code":"AUD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0689\/0268\/2707\/files\/Yourparagraphtext_84.png?v=1778062720"},{"product_id":"in-spite-of-you-by-patrick-lenton","title":"'In Spite of You' by Patrick Lenton","description":"\u003ch4 data-start=\"0\" data-end=\"652\"\u003eHumiliation as both tragedy and social performance.\u003c\/h4\u003e\n\u003cp data-start=\"0\" data-end=\"652\"\u003e\u003cmeta charset=\"utf-8\"\u003eThe setup is deceptively simple: Jeremy has been publicly dumped by his boyfriend for a younger, hotter man, and decides the only reasonable response is to become hotter, more successful, and more emotionally devastating than everyone around him. Naturally, this goes badly.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp data-start=\"0\" data-end=\"652\"\u003eIt sits somewhere between queer romantic comedy and millennial revenge fantasy, moving with the pace and sharpness of someone spiralling in real time while still trying to sound clever at the group chat. But what gives the novel its texture is that it never fully commits to cynicism or sincerity. Instead it hovers in that deeply contemporary emotional register where therapy language, self-branding, activism, dating apps, climate anxiety, casual narcissism, doomscrolling and genuine loneliness all bleed into one another.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp data-start=\"0\" data-end=\"652\"\u003eThe dialogue is fast, acidic and very funny in a specifically Australian way — people weaponising irony because they’re terrified of saying anything directly. Lenton is especially good at social scenes where everyone is simultaneously trying to perform ethical correctness, desirability and emotional maturity while quietly losing their minds underneath. \u003cmeta charset=\"utf-8\"\u003eA strong pick for readers of contemporary queer fiction, millennial satire, messy interpersonal dynamics, and sharply observed social comedy.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp data-start=\"1916\" data-end=\"2161\"\u003e\u003cstrong\u003ePaperback edition published by Pantera Press in 2025. Near-fine condition with only minimal shelf wear. \u003c\/strong\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"bower studio","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":44600376524883,"sku":null,"price":17.0,"currency_code":"AUD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0689\/0268\/2707\/files\/Yourparagraphtext-2026-05-12T154527.761.png?v=1778564739"},{"product_id":"furioso-by-voldemar-lestienne","title":"'Furioso' by Voldemar Lestienne","description":"\u003ch4 data-start=\"0\" data-end=\"454\"\u003ePitched as an 'updated' version of The Three Musketeers, though, it's hard to see the line drawn once it fully starts going.\u003c\/h4\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eVoldemar Lestienne’s \u003cem data-start=\"21\" data-end=\"30\"\u003eFurioso\u003c\/em\u003e is a world full of soldiers, gas chambers, mystery women, bath-water, broken bottles, sexual humiliation, bureaucratic violence and a kind of manic theatricality that makes the whole thing feel as if fascism has been rewritten as a feverish domestic opera.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp data-start=\"456\" data-end=\"962\"\u003eThe prose moves quickly and oddly, with absurd set-pieces sliding into brutality before anyone has time to behave sensibly. There is something of the postwar European grotesque here: history not as solemn lesson, but as contamination, slapstick, erotic panic, bad faith and costume.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp data-start=\"456\" data-end=\"962\"\u003eNot a polite novel, and probably not a book for someone looking for tidy moral architecture. More for the reader who likes their fiction rancid, sharp, unstable and wearing evening gloves while setting fire to the curtains.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp data-start=\"973\" data-end=\"1190\"\u003e\u003cstrong\u003eW. H. Allen English translation, 1972; originally published by Librairie Arthème Fayard in 1971. Printed boards, dust jacket present. Light rubbing and edge wear to boards, pages lightly toned, clean readable copy.\u003c\/strong\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"bower studio","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":44656209330259,"sku":null,"price":20.0,"currency_code":"AUD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0689\/0268\/2707\/files\/Yourparagraphtext-2026-05-25T170703.685.png?v=1779692846"},{"product_id":"mad-honey-by-bc-oost","title":"'mad honey' by BC Oost","description":"\u003ch4 data-start=\"0\" data-end=\"477\"\u003eA small-press poetry object with a pleasingly feral internal logic.\u003c\/h4\u003e\n\u003cp data-start=\"0\" data-end=\"477\"\u003eIt explores insects, sex, factories, queer violence, body parts, saints, circuitry, product lines, temple walls, nerve signals, and the ugly little economies that sit inside pleasure. The poems move across the page as much as along it, using spacing, fracture, drift, curved text and visual arrangement to make reading feel less like receiving a message than walking through a damaged sensorium.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp data-start=\"479\" data-end=\"916\"\u003eThink erotic language under a microscope: desire broken into anatomy, voltage, slang, commodity, residue. Strange, local, tactile, formally restless, with enough venom in the honey to keep the whole thing from becoming decorative.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp data-start=\"1071\" data-end=\"1268\" data-is-last-node=\"\" data-is-only-node=\"\"\u003e\u003cstrong\u003e2018 paperback published by Hit \u0026amp; Miss Productions, University of Melbourne. Inscribed by the author on the title page. Light handling wear to cover; pages clean and bright. Solid small-press copy.\u003c\/strong\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"bower studio","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":44656244621395,"sku":null,"price":16.0,"currency_code":"AUD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0689\/0268\/2707\/files\/Yourparagraphtext-2026-05-25T171931.706.png?v=1779693587"},{"product_id":"the-bloody-chamber-by-angela-carter","title":"'The Bloody Chamber' by Angela Carter","description":"\u003cdiv class=\"qMYqUG_convSearchResultHighlightRoot\"\u003e\n\u003cdiv class=\"\" data-turn-id-container=\"request-WEB:3f9281a3-b778-4d96-ae50-6996ad1c6227-66\" data-is-intersecting=\"true\"\u003e\n\u003csection class=\"text-token-text-primary w-full focus:outline-none has-data-writing-block:pointer-events-none [\u0026amp;:has([data-writing-block])\u0026gt;*]:pointer-events-auto R6Vx5W_threadScrollVars scroll-mb-[calc(var(--scroll-root-safe-area-inset-bottom,0px)+var(--thread-response-height))] scroll-mt-[calc(var(--header-height)+min(200px,max(70px,20svh)))]\" dir=\"auto\" data-turn-id=\"request-WEB:3f9281a3-b778-4d96-ae50-6996ad1c6227-66\" data-turn-id-container=\"request-WEB:3f9281a3-b778-4d96-ae50-6996ad1c6227-66\" data-testid=\"conversation-turn-32\" data-scroll-anchor=\"false\" data-turn=\"assistant\"\u003e\n\u003cdiv class=\"text-base my-auto mx-auto pb-10 [--thread-content-margin:var(--thread-content-margin-xs,calc(var(--spacing)*4))] @w-sm\/main:[--thread-content-margin:var(--thread-content-margin-sm,calc(var(--spacing)*6))] @w-lg\/main:[--thread-content-margin:var(--thread-content-margin-lg,calc(var(--spacing)*16))] px-(--thread-content-margin)\"\u003e\n\u003cdiv class=\"[--thread-content-max-width:40rem] @w-lg\/main:[--thread-content-max-width:48rem] mx-auto max-w-(--thread-content-max-width) flex-1 group\/turn-messages focus-visible:outline-hidden relative flex w-full min-w-0 flex-col agent-turn\"\u003e\n\u003cdiv class=\"flex max-w-full flex-col gap-4 grow\"\u003e\n\u003cdiv data-message-author-role=\"assistant\" data-message-id=\"6985b574-45da-4267-b22f-9744b9c398f8\" dir=\"auto\" data-message-model-slug=\"gpt-5-5-thinking\" class=\"min-h-8 text-message relative flex w-full flex-col items-end gap-2 text-start break-words whitespace-normal outline-none keyboard-focused:focus-ring [.text-message+\u0026amp;]:mt-1\" data-turn-start-message=\"true\" tabindex=\"0\"\u003e\n\u003cdiv class=\"flex w-full flex-col gap-1 empty:hidden\"\u003e\n\u003cdiv class=\"markdown prose dark:prose-invert wrap-break-word w-full dark markdown-new-styling\"\u003e\n\u003ch4 data-start=\"0\" data-end=\"419\"\u003eAngela Carter’s \u003cem data-start=\"16\" data-end=\"36\"\u003eThe Bloody Chamber\u003c\/em\u003e takes fairy tales back from the nursery and returns them to the locked rooms they were always hiding. \u003c\/h4\u003e\n\u003cp data-start=\"0\" data-end=\"419\"\u003eThese are not retellings in the polite “modern twist” sense. Carter opens Bluebeard, Beauty and the Beast, Little Red Riding Hood and their relatives with a scalpel, then lets the old machinery keep moving. The result is lush, gothic, erotic, funny, and intellectually vicious.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp data-start=\"0\" data-end=\"419\"\u003eCarter understands that fairy tales are not simple moral containers but pressure chambers: places where gender, power, desire, danger and transformation can appear in their most concentrated forms. Her prose is famously rich, but not decorative. It works like velvet over a blade.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp data-start=\"774\" data-end=\"996\"\u003eA foundational book for anyone interested in gothic fiction, feminist revision, folklore, horror, surrealism, myth, and the deep weirdness of stories that pretend to be simple because they know exactly what they are doing.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp data-start=\"1007\" data-end=\"1248\" data-is-last-node=\"\" data-is-only-node=\"\"\u003e\u003cstrong\u003eVintage Classics hardback edition, 2006 imprint; first published in 1979. Includes introduction by Helen Simpson. Noticeable cover wear, creasing and corner bumping, especially top front corner; pages clean and readable. Solid reading copy.\u003c\/strong\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003c\/div\u003e\n\u003c\/div\u003e\n\u003c\/div\u003e\n\u003c\/div\u003e\n\u003c\/div\u003e\n\u003c\/div\u003e\n\u003c\/section\u003e\n\u003c\/div\u003e\n\u003c\/div\u003e","brand":"bower studio","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":44656268214355,"sku":null,"price":19.0,"currency_code":"AUD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0689\/0268\/2707\/files\/Yourparagraphtext-2026-05-25T174045.695.png?v=1779694857"},{"product_id":"new-animal-by-ella-baxter","title":"'New Animal' by Ella Baxter","description":"\u003cdiv class=\"qMYqUG_convSearchResultHighlightRoot\"\u003e\n\u003cdiv class=\"\" data-turn-id-container=\"request-6a13ebf1-e3bc-83ec-8e04-eb5854921a4e-6\" data-is-intersecting=\"true\"\u003e\n\u003csection class=\"text-token-text-primary w-full focus:outline-none has-data-writing-block:pointer-events-none [\u0026amp;:has([data-writing-block])\u0026gt;*]:pointer-events-auto R6Vx5W_threadScrollVars scroll-mb-[calc(var(--scroll-root-safe-area-inset-bottom,0px)+var(--thread-response-height))] scroll-mt-[calc(var(--header-height)+min(200px,max(70px,20svh)))]\" dir=\"auto\" data-turn-id=\"request-6a13ebf1-e3bc-83ec-8e04-eb5854921a4e-6\" data-turn-id-container=\"request-6a13ebf1-e3bc-83ec-8e04-eb5854921a4e-6\" data-testid=\"conversation-turn-50\" data-scroll-anchor=\"false\" data-turn=\"assistant\"\u003e\n\u003cdiv class=\"text-base my-auto mx-auto pb-10 [--thread-content-margin:var(--thread-content-margin-xs,calc(var(--spacing)*4))] @w-sm\/main:[--thread-content-margin:var(--thread-content-margin-sm,calc(var(--spacing)*6))] @w-lg\/main:[--thread-content-margin:var(--thread-content-margin-lg,calc(var(--spacing)*16))] px-(--thread-content-margin)\"\u003e\n\u003cdiv class=\"[--thread-content-max-width:40rem] @w-lg\/main:[--thread-content-max-width:48rem] mx-auto max-w-(--thread-content-max-width) flex-1 group\/turn-messages focus-visible:outline-hidden relative flex w-full min-w-0 flex-col agent-turn\"\u003e\n\u003cdiv class=\"flex max-w-full flex-col gap-4 grow\"\u003e\n\u003cdiv data-message-author-role=\"assistant\" data-message-id=\"442010e4-6afd-4ef9-be9a-fcb3b3db2a91\" dir=\"auto\" data-message-model-slug=\"gpt-5-5-thinking\" class=\"min-h-8 text-message relative flex w-full flex-col items-end gap-2 text-start break-words whitespace-normal outline-none keyboard-focused:focus-ring [.text-message+\u0026amp;]:mt-1\" data-turn-start-message=\"true\" tabindex=\"0\"\u003e\n\u003cdiv class=\"flex w-full flex-col gap-1 empty:hidden\"\u003e\n\u003cdiv class=\"markdown prose dark:prose-invert wrap-break-word w-full light markdown-new-styling\"\u003e\n\u003ch4 data-start=\"0\" data-end=\"414\"\u003eA grief novel with its skin on inside out.\u003c\/h4\u003e\n\u003cp data-start=\"0\" data-end=\"414\"\u003eAmelia is a cosmetic mortician, professionally fluent in making dead bodies look peaceful, while her own life is held together by sex, avoidance and shock. \u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp data-start=\"416\" data-end=\"831\"\u003eThe book is funny, filthy, raw and weirdly tender, which is a hard little animal to keep alive without making it cute. Baxter writes about death, desire, work, bodies, motherhood, disgust and dissociation with a sharp eye for the absurd rituals people use to survive feeling too much. There’s a strong contemporary Australian sensibility here: deadpan, bodily, emotionally intelligent, allergic to clean redemption.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp data-start=\"833\" data-end=\"975\"\u003eGood for readers who like grief fiction that does not arrive wearing linen and whispering about healing. More meat locker than meditation app.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp data-start=\"986\" data-end=\"1192\" data-is-last-node=\"\" data-is-only-node=\"\"\u003e\u003cstrong\u003eAllen \u0026amp; Unwin paperback, first published 2021; number line indicates first printing. Light cover and edge wear, with visible creasing to front cover and corners; pages appear clean and readable. Solid copy.\u003c\/strong\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003c\/div\u003e\n\u003c\/div\u003e\n\u003c\/div\u003e\n\u003c\/div\u003e\n\u003c\/div\u003e\n\u003c\/div\u003e\n\u003c\/section\u003e\n\u003c\/div\u003e\n\u003c\/div\u003e","brand":"bower studio","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":44657793499219,"sku":null,"price":16.0,"currency_code":"AUD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0689\/0268\/2707\/files\/Yourparagraphtext-2026-05-26T101916.750.png?v=1779754768"},{"product_id":"the-coin-by-yasmin-zaher","title":"'The Coin' by Yasmin Zaher","description":"\u003cdiv class=\"qMYqUG_convSearchResultHighlightRoot\"\u003e\n\u003cdiv class=\"\" data-turn-id-container=\"request-6a13ebf1-e3bc-83ec-8e04-eb5854921a4e-14\" data-is-intersecting=\"true\"\u003e\n\u003csection class=\"text-token-text-primary w-full focus:outline-none has-data-writing-block:pointer-events-none [\u0026amp;:has([data-writing-block])\u0026gt;*]:pointer-events-auto R6Vx5W_threadScrollVars scroll-mb-[calc(var(--scroll-root-safe-area-inset-bottom,0px)+var(--thread-response-height))] scroll-mt-[calc(var(--header-height)+min(200px,max(70px,20svh)))]\" dir=\"auto\" data-turn-id=\"request-6a13ebf1-e3bc-83ec-8e04-eb5854921a4e-14\" data-turn-id-container=\"request-6a13ebf1-e3bc-83ec-8e04-eb5854921a4e-14\" data-testid=\"conversation-turn-108\" data-scroll-anchor=\"false\" data-turn=\"assistant\"\u003e\n\u003cdiv class=\"text-base my-auto mx-auto pb-10 [--thread-content-margin:var(--thread-content-margin-xs,calc(var(--spacing)*4))] @w-sm\/main:[--thread-content-margin:var(--thread-content-margin-sm,calc(var(--spacing)*6))] @w-lg\/main:[--thread-content-margin:var(--thread-content-margin-lg,calc(var(--spacing)*16))] px-(--thread-content-margin)\"\u003e\n\u003cdiv class=\"[--thread-content-max-width:40rem] @w-lg\/main:[--thread-content-max-width:48rem] mx-auto max-w-(--thread-content-max-width) flex-1 group\/turn-messages focus-visible:outline-hidden relative flex w-full min-w-0 flex-col agent-turn\"\u003e\n\u003cdiv class=\"flex max-w-full flex-col gap-4 grow\"\u003e\n\u003cdiv data-message-author-role=\"assistant\" data-message-id=\"e3127fb9-36b0-4793-84e0-ee2136d2a5d2\" data-turn-start-message=\"true\" dir=\"auto\" data-message-model-slug=\"gpt-5-5-thinking\" class=\"min-h-8 text-message relative flex w-full flex-col items-end gap-2 text-start break-words whitespace-normal outline-none keyboard-focused:focus-ring [.text-message+\u0026amp;]:mt-1\" tabindex=\"0\"\u003e\n\u003cdiv class=\"flex w-full flex-col gap-1 empty:hidden\"\u003e\n\u003cdiv class=\"markdown prose dark:prose-invert wrap-break-word w-full light markdown-new-styling\"\u003e\n\u003ch4 data-start=\"317\" data-end=\"642\"\u003eA young Palestinian woman teaching at a New York middle school becomes increasingly untethered by money, beauty, cleanliness, power and desire.\u003c\/h4\u003e\n\u003cp data-start=\"317\" data-end=\"642\"\u003eWealthy but stateless, precise but unstable, she moves between classroom life, obsessive rituals, bad men, luxury objects and the strange spiritual theatre of ownership.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp data-start=\"644\" data-end=\"1036\"\u003e\u003cem data-start=\"644\" data-end=\"654\"\u003eThe Coin\u003c\/em\u003e is a debut novel with a serrated little pulse: funny, filthy, elegant, politically uneasy and psychologically strange without flattening itself into issue-fiction. It sits somewhere between contemporary New York novel, dissociation spiral, class satire and body-horror of the self — a book about what happens when identity, money and control become indistinguishable from appetite.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp data-start=\"644\" data-end=\"1036\"\u003e\u003cstrong data-start=\"1059\" data-end=\"1082\"\u003e\u003c\/strong\u003e\u003cstrong\u003e2024 Footnote Press paperback, first printing. Near fine condition, with only very light shelf wear. Clean, bright copy.\u003c\/strong\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003c\/div\u003e\n\u003c\/div\u003e\n\u003c\/div\u003e\n\u003c\/div\u003e\n\u003c\/div\u003e\n\u003c\/div\u003e\n\u003c\/section\u003e\n\u003c\/div\u003e\n\u003c\/div\u003e","brand":"bower studio","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":44658138710099,"sku":null,"price":16.0,"currency_code":"AUD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0689\/0268\/2707\/files\/Yourparagraphtext-2026-05-26T152804.165.png?v=1779773301"},{"product_id":"leader-of-the-band-by-fay-weldon","title":"'Leader of the Band' by Fay Weldon","description":"\u003cdiv class=\"qMYqUG_convSearchResultHighlightRoot\"\u003e\n\u003cdiv class=\"\" data-turn-id-container=\"request-6a13ebf1-e3bc-83ec-8e04-eb5854921a4e-19\" data-is-intersecting=\"true\"\u003e\n\u003csection class=\"text-token-text-primary w-full focus:outline-none has-data-writing-block:pointer-events-none [\u0026amp;:has([data-writing-block])\u0026gt;*]:pointer-events-auto R6Vx5W_threadScrollVars scroll-mb-[calc(var(--scroll-root-safe-area-inset-bottom,0px)+var(--thread-response-height))] scroll-mt-[calc(var(--header-height)+min(200px,max(70px,20svh)))]\" dir=\"auto\" data-turn-id=\"request-6a13ebf1-e3bc-83ec-8e04-eb5854921a4e-19\" data-turn-id-container=\"request-6a13ebf1-e3bc-83ec-8e04-eb5854921a4e-19\" data-testid=\"conversation-turn-170\" data-scroll-anchor=\"false\" data-turn=\"assistant\"\u003e\n\u003cdiv class=\"text-base my-auto mx-auto pb-10 [--thread-content-margin:var(--thread-content-margin-xs,calc(var(--spacing)*4))] @w-sm\/main:[--thread-content-margin:var(--thread-content-margin-sm,calc(var(--spacing)*6))] @w-lg\/main:[--thread-content-margin:var(--thread-content-margin-lg,calc(var(--spacing)*16))] px-(--thread-content-margin)\"\u003e\n\u003cdiv class=\"[--thread-content-max-width:40rem] @w-lg\/main:[--thread-content-max-width:48rem] mx-auto max-w-(--thread-content-max-width) flex-1 group\/turn-messages focus-visible:outline-hidden relative flex w-full min-w-0 flex-col agent-turn\"\u003e\n\u003cdiv class=\"flex max-w-full flex-col gap-4 grow\"\u003e\n\u003cdiv data-message-author-role=\"assistant\" data-message-id=\"e4c6c96d-f7e3-4534-8045-9d90d6d2acdb\" data-turn-start-message=\"true\" dir=\"auto\" data-message-model-slug=\"gpt-5-5-thinking\" class=\"min-h-8 text-message relative flex w-full flex-col items-end gap-2 text-start break-words whitespace-normal outline-none keyboard-focused:focus-ring [.text-message+\u0026amp;]:mt-1\" tabindex=\"0\"\u003e\n\u003cdiv class=\"flex w-full flex-col gap-1 empty:hidden\"\u003e\n\u003cdiv class=\"markdown prose dark:prose-invert wrap-break-word w-full light markdown-new-styling\"\u003e\n\u003ch4 data-start=\"156\" data-end=\"609\"\u003eStarlady Sandra is a television astronomer, wife, mother, public woman, private mess, and apparently not content to remain politely arranged inside anyone else’s idea of sense.\u003c\/h4\u003e\n\u003cp data-start=\"156\" data-end=\"609\"\u003eWhen she abandons her barrister husband and runs off with the leader of a band, the novel, and her life, become a sharp little detonation of marriage, fantasy, female appetite, motherhood, ambition, and the stories women are expected to keep tidy.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp data-start=\"611\" data-end=\"995\"\u003eWeldon is very good at making domestic life feel like a rigged experiment: funny, bitter, agile, and slightly radioactive. This is a novel about wanting more, then discovering that “more” is not freedom so much as another room with worse lighting. For readers who like their feminist fiction clever, unsentimental, sexually alert, and full of women behaving inconveniently on purpose.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp data-start=\"611\" data-end=\"995\"\u003e\u003cstrong data-start=\"1389\" data-end=\"1412\"\u003e\u003c\/strong\u003e\u003cstrong\u003eFirst American edition hardback, published by Viking Penguin, 1989. Dust jacket present. Ex-library copy with library stamp\/markings to copyright page and protective cover remnants\/handling wear visible. Jacket has edge wear, rubbing, and creasing, especially around the spine and corners. Pages clean and readable. \u003c\/strong\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003c\/div\u003e\n\u003c\/div\u003e\n\u003c\/div\u003e\n\u003c\/div\u003e\n\u003c\/div\u003e\n\u003c\/div\u003e\n\u003c\/section\u003e\n\u003c\/div\u003e\n\u003c\/div\u003e","brand":"bower studio","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":44785784094803,"sku":null,"price":18.0,"currency_code":"AUD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0689\/0268\/2707\/files\/Yourparagraphtext-2026-05-29T153423.830.png?v=1780032909"},{"product_id":"iron-lung-by-kirstine-reffstrup","title":"'Iron Lung' by Kirstine Reffstrup","description":"\u003ch4 data-start=\"220\" data-end=\"740\"\u003eBodies bodies bodies. Medical, social, sexual, mechanical, historical.\u003c\/h4\u003e\n\u003cp data-start=\"220\" data-end=\"740\"\u003eOne thread follows a girl in 1950s Copenhagen who is paralysed by polio and placed inside an iron lung; another moves back forty years to a child known as “Boy” in an orphanage near Budapest, whose body refuses the categories being imposed on it. Across time, illness, gender, machinery and desire begin to speak to each other in ways that feel like a current running under the floorboards.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp data-start=\"742\" data-end=\"1211\"\u003eThis is literary fiction with a fever-glass quality: intimate, bodily, eerie, and unusually precise. Reffstrup is working in the territory of adolescence, embodiment, medical control, sexuality and transformation, but without turning any of it into a neat little lesson, thank god. One for readers who like their fiction translated, unsettling, formally alert, and interested in what happens when a body becomes a site of interpretation before it gets to become a self.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp data-start=\"1213\" data-end=\"1478\"\u003e\u003cstrong\u003eFirst English-language edition, first published in Great Britain by Peirene Press, 2025. Translated from the Danish by Hunter Simpson. Paperback. Excellent used condition with only very light shelf\/handling wear. Pages clean, binding sound.\u003c\/strong\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"bower studio","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":44834388181075,"sku":null,"price":20.0,"currency_code":"AUD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0689\/0268\/2707\/files\/Yourparagraphtext-2026-05-30T120943.043.png?v=1780106996"},{"product_id":"erotic-poems-edited-by-peter-washington","title":"'Erotic Poems' edited by Peter Washington","description":"\u003ch4 data-start=\"286\" data-end=\"772\"\u003e\n\u003cem data-start=\"286\" data-end=\"300\"\u003eErotic Poems\u003c\/em\u003e is an Everyman’s Library Pocket Poets anthology selected by Peter Washington, gathering erotic verse across centuries, moods, and traditions.\u003c\/h4\u003e\n\u003cp data-start=\"286\" data-end=\"772\"\u003eThe contents move from Ovid, Hafiz, Horace, Baudelaire, and Bhartrhari through to Robert Graves, Octavio Paz, Thom Gunn, Paul Éluard, Joseph Brodsky, and others — less a novelty book than a compact survey of desire as appetite, wit, longing, embarrassment, worship, theatre, and language having a little too much fun with itself.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp data-start=\"774\" data-end=\"1136\"\u003eThis is a handsome little hardback, the erotic here is not just decorative steam on the mirror; it ranges from courtly to comic, devotional to filthy-adjacent, tender to appalled. Good for poetry browsers, gift-givers with taste, and anyone who prefers desire written by people with real sentence-level control.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp data-start=\"1162\" data-end=\"1303\"\u003e\u003cstrong\u003eEveryman’s Library Pocket Poets hardback, 1994. Very good, with light shelf wear to boards\/jacket and mild page toning. Ribbon marker intact.\u003c\/strong\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"bower studio","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":44972599279699,"sku":null,"price":13.0,"currency_code":"AUD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0689\/0268\/2707\/files\/Yourparagraphtext-2026-05-31T145946.072.png?v=1780203598"},{"product_id":"quinx-or-a-rippers-tale-by-lawrence-durrell","title":"'Quinx; or A Ripper's Tale' by Lawrence Durrell","description":"\u003ch4 data-start=\"407\" data-end=\"862\"\u003e\n\u003cem data-start=\"407\" data-end=\"437\"\u003eQuinx; or, The Ripper’s Tale\u003c\/em\u003e closes Lawrence Durrell’s \u003cem data-start=\"464\" data-end=\"481\"\u003eAvignon Quintet\u003c\/em\u003e, returning to the aftermath of war, old wounds, unfinished love affairs, psychoanalysis, myth, conspiracy and all the rest.\u003c\/h4\u003e\n\u003cp data-start=\"407\" data-end=\"862\"\u003eAubrey Blanford comes back to Avignon among friends, ghosts, doubles, lovers, and seekers, as the series folds its own narrative threads into something part mystery, part metaphysical comedy, part late-style Durrell fever dream.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp data-start=\"864\" data-end=\"1214\"\u003eThis is not a neat standalone novel so much as the final chamber of a strange literary house. Best for readers already interested in Durrell, twentieth-century modernist excess, European postwar fiction, or books that treat plot as a door that may or may not open onto sex, memory, theology, and someone muttering about the Templars in the next room.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp data-start=\"1240\" data-end=\"1381\"\u003e\u003cstrong\u003eFirst US edition, Viking hardback, 1985. Very good in dust jacket, with light jacket wear and mild page toning. Clean internally.\u003c\/strong\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"bower studio","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":44985314279507,"sku":null,"price":30.0,"currency_code":"AUD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0689\/0268\/2707\/files\/Yourparagraphtext-2026-05-31T172420.676.png?v=1780212345"},{"product_id":"sebastian-or-ruling-passions-by-lawrence-durrell","title":"'Sebastian; or, Ruling Passions' by Lawrence Durrell","description":"\u003ch4 data-start=\"351\" data-end=\"807\"\u003e\n\u003cem data-start=\"351\" data-end=\"383\"\u003eSebastian; or, Ruling Passions\u003c\/em\u003e is the fourth volume in Lawrence Durrell’s \u003cem data-start=\"427\" data-end=\"444\"\u003eAvignon Quintet\u003c\/em\u003e, moving between postwar Europe, Egypt, religious secrecy, psychoanalysis, erotic memory, and the layered games of fiction itself.\u003c\/h4\u003e\n\u003cp data-start=\"351\" data-end=\"807\"\u003eSebastian Affad is drawn back into the orbit of a Gnostic sect after a fatal message and a doctrinal mix-up, while Constance and the wider Durrellian universe continue to tangle love, metaphysics, history, and feverish conversation.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp data-start=\"809\" data-end=\"1187\"\u003eThis is late Durrell in full silk-and-incense mode: elliptical, sensual, clever, occasionally absurd, and very much not interested in behaving like a tidy realist novel. Best for readers already curious about Durrell, twentieth-century literary excess, modernist afterlives, and books where theology and desire keep slipping into the same room and pretending it was an accident.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp data-start=\"1213\" data-end=\"1394\"\u003e\u003cstrong\u003eFirst UK edition, Faber hardback, 1983. Ex-library copy with stamps, labels, and borrowing sheet. Very good reading copy in dust jacket, with light jacket wear and mild page toning.\u003c\/strong\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"bower studio","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":44985604374611,"sku":null,"price":25.0,"currency_code":"AUD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0689\/0268\/2707\/files\/Yourparagraphtext-2026-05-31T172843.120.png?v=1780212536"},{"product_id":"monsieur-or-the-prince-of-darkness-by-lawrence-durrell","title":"'Monsieur; or, The Prince of Darkness' by Lawrence Durrell","description":"\u003ch4 data-start=\"369\" data-end=\"739\"\u003e\n\u003cem data-start=\"369\" data-end=\"407\"\u003eMonsieur; or, The Prince of Darkness\u003c\/em\u003e opens Lawrence Durrell’s \u003cem data-start=\"433\" data-end=\"450\"\u003eAvignon Quintet\u003c\/em\u003e, shifting the centre of his fictional universe from Alexandria to Avignon.\u003c\/h4\u003e\n\u003cp data-start=\"369\" data-end=\"739\"\u003eAround a decaying château near the city, Durrell gathers doctors, siblings, lovers, mystics, suicides, and conspirators into a novel of Gnostic cults, Templar shadows, erotic entanglement, and narrative trapdoors.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp data-start=\"741\" data-end=\"1092\"\u003eIt’s a strange, theatrical book: part metaphysical mystery, part postwar European fever dream, part literary machine built out of mirrors and bad decisions. Best for readers drawn to Durrell, modernist afterlives, mythic fiction, and novels where nobody can enter a room without dragging in twelve symbolic systems and at least one doomed love affair.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp data-start=\"1118\" data-end=\"1270\"\u003e\u003cstrong\u003eFirst UK edition, Faber hardback, 1974. Very good in dust jacket, with light jacket wear, mild toning, and faint foxing\/spotting to edges and endpapers.\u003c\/strong\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"bower studio","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":44986754826323,"sku":null,"price":35.0,"currency_code":"AUD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0689\/0268\/2707\/files\/Yourparagraphtext-2026-05-31T173254.012.png?v=1780213285"},{"product_id":"avignon-quintet-by-lawrence-durrell","title":"'Avignon Quintet' by Lawrence Durrell","description":"\u003ch4 data-start=\"471\" data-end=\"969\"\u003eLawrence Durrell’s \u003cem data-start=\"490\" data-end=\"511\"\u003eThe Avignon Quintet\u003c\/em\u003e is a strange, ornate, self-folding sequence of five connected novels: \u003cem data-start=\"582\" data-end=\"592\"\u003eMonsieur\u003c\/em\u003e, \u003cem data-start=\"594\" data-end=\"601\"\u003eLivia\u003c\/em\u003e, \u003cem data-start=\"603\" data-end=\"614\"\u003eConstance\u003c\/em\u003e, \u003cem data-start=\"616\" data-end=\"627\"\u003eSebastian\u003c\/em\u003e, and \u003cem data-start=\"633\" data-end=\"640\"\u003eQuinx\u003c\/em\u003e.\u003c\/h4\u003e\n\u003cp data-start=\"471\" data-end=\"969\"\u003eWritten after \u003cem data-start=\"656\" data-end=\"680\"\u003eThe Alexandria Quartet\u003c\/em\u003e, the quintet moves Durrell’s fictional universe from Alexandria to Avignon, opening into a world of châteaux, wartime Europe, Egypt, Gnostic sects, Templar legends, psychoanalysis, erotic entanglement, doubles, manuscripts, ghosts, and narrative rooms that do not stay where they are put.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp data-start=\"971\" data-end=\"1381\"\u003eThis is late Durrell in full performance: sensuous, excessive, clever, mystic, theatrical, sometimes maddening, often brilliant. Best for readers who like modernist afterlives, European literary weirdness, metaphysical conspiracy, and novels where love affairs, religious heresies, war memory, and literary form all keep sliding into one another like someone has spilled wine on the floor plan of civilisation.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp data-start=\"1407\" data-end=\"1804\"\u003e\u003cstrong\u003eComplete five-volume \u003cem data-start=\"1428\" data-end=\"1445\"\u003eAvignon Quintet\u003c\/em\u003e bundle. Includes Faber hardbacks of \u003cem data-start=\"1482\" data-end=\"1492\"\u003eMonsieur\u003c\/em\u003e, \u003cem data-start=\"1494\" data-end=\"1501\"\u003eLivia\u003c\/em\u003e, \u003cem data-start=\"1503\" data-end=\"1514\"\u003eConstance\u003c\/em\u003e, and \u003cem data-start=\"1520\" data-end=\"1531\"\u003eSebastian\u003c\/em\u003e, plus Viking hardback of \u003cem data-start=\"1557\" data-end=\"1564\"\u003eQuinx\u003c\/em\u003e. First editions where noted from photos; \u003cem data-start=\"1606\" data-end=\"1617\"\u003eSebastian\u003c\/em\u003e is ex-library with stamps, labels, and borrowing sheet. Overall good to very good vintage condition, with dust jackets, light shelf wear, mild toning\/spotting, and some edge\/corner wear.\u003c\/strong\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"bower books","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":44986986070099,"sku":null,"price":150.0,"currency_code":"AUD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0689\/0268\/2707\/files\/Yourparagraphtext-2026-05-31T174237.939.png?v=1780213494"},{"product_id":"dear-dickhead-a-novel-by-virginie-despentes","title":"'Dear Dickhead: A Novel' by Virginie Despentes","description":"\u003cdiv class=\"qMYqUG_convSearchResultHighlightRoot\"\u003e\n\u003cdiv class=\"\" data-turn-id-container=\"request-6a1ba90f-e9f8-83ec-aaef-42800be6dcb2-19\" data-is-intersecting=\"true\"\u003e\n\u003csection class=\"text-token-text-primary w-full focus:outline-none has-data-writing-block:pointer-events-none [\u0026amp;:has([data-writing-block])\u0026gt;*]:pointer-events-auto R6Vx5W_threadScrollVars scroll-mb-[calc(var(--scroll-root-safe-area-inset-bottom,0px)+var(--thread-response-height))] scroll-mt-[calc(var(--header-height)+min(200px,max(70px,20svh)))]\" dir=\"auto\" data-turn-id=\"request-6a1ba90f-e9f8-83ec-aaef-42800be6dcb2-19\" data-turn-id-container=\"request-6a1ba90f-e9f8-83ec-aaef-42800be6dcb2-19\" data-testid=\"conversation-turn-108\" data-scroll-anchor=\"false\" data-turn=\"assistant\"\u003e\n\u003cdiv class=\"text-base my-auto mx-auto pb-10 [--thread-content-margin:var(--thread-content-margin-xs,calc(var(--spacing)*4))] @w-sm\/main:[--thread-content-margin:var(--thread-content-margin-sm,calc(var(--spacing)*6))] @w-lg\/main:[--thread-content-margin:var(--thread-content-margin-lg,calc(var(--spacing)*16))] px-(--thread-content-margin)\"\u003e\n\u003cdiv class=\"[--thread-content-max-width:40rem] @w-lg\/main:[--thread-content-max-width:48rem] mx-auto max-w-(--thread-content-max-width) flex-1 group\/turn-messages focus-visible:outline-hidden relative flex w-full min-w-0 flex-col agent-turn\"\u003e\n\u003cdiv class=\"flex max-w-full flex-col gap-4 grow\"\u003e\n\u003cdiv data-message-author-role=\"assistant\" data-message-id=\"039f646f-eb87-420e-9c73-cf230bdce0c7\" data-turn-start-message=\"true\" dir=\"auto\" data-message-model-slug=\"gpt-5-5-thinking\" class=\"min-h-8 text-message relative flex w-full flex-col items-end gap-2 text-start break-words whitespace-normal outline-none keyboard-focused:focus-ring [.text-message+\u0026amp;]:mt-1\" tabindex=\"0\"\u003e\n\u003cdiv class=\"flex w-full flex-col gap-1 empty:hidden\"\u003e\n\u003cdiv class=\"markdown prose dark:prose-invert wrap-break-word w-full light markdown-new-styling\"\u003e\n\u003ch4 data-start=\"378\" data-end=\"1031\"\u003eVirginie Despentes’ \u003cem data-start=\"411\" data-end=\"426\"\u003eDear Dickhead\u003c\/em\u003e is a vicious, funny, bruised epistolary novel about the intimacy of writing to someone you claim to despise.\u003c\/h4\u003e\n\u003cp data-start=\"378\" data-end=\"1031\"\u003eBuilt through emails and messages between a washed-up novelist, a film actress, and a young feminist blogger, it moves through online outrage and private collapse with Despentes’ usual combination of fury, filth, intelligence, and weird tenderness. \u003cmeta charset=\"utf-8\"\u003eVirginie Despentes is one of contemporary French literature’s great literary irritants, in the best possible sense: novelist, filmmaker, punk witness, former sex worker, and author of \u003cem data-start=\"299\" data-end=\"310\" data-is-only-node=\"\"\u003eBaise-moi\u003c\/em\u003e, \u003cem data-start=\"312\" data-end=\"330\"\u003eKing Kong Theory\u003c\/em\u003e, and the \u003cem data-start=\"340\" data-end=\"356\"\u003eVernon Subutex\u003c\/em\u003e trilogy. Her work has long circled sex, violence, shame, class, celebrity, addiction, feminism, and the social scripts people pretend they’ve transcended.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp data-start=\"378\" data-end=\"1031\"\u003eGood for readers of Rachel Kushner, Chris Kraus, Deborah Levy, Virginie Despentes generally, and anyone who likes their literary fiction with teeth still attached.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp data-start=\"378\" data-end=\"1031\"\u003e\u003cstrong\u003eHardback edition, first published in Great Britain in 2024 by Fitzcarraldo \/ Éditions Grasset \u0026amp; Fasquelle in translation by Frank Wynne. Very good to near fine condition, with only light handling wear visible. Internal pages appear clean and well kept.\u003c\/strong\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003c\/div\u003e\n\u003c\/div\u003e\n\u003c\/div\u003e\n\u003c\/div\u003e\n\u003c\/div\u003e\n\u003c\/div\u003e\n\u003c\/section\u003e\n\u003c\/div\u003e\n\u003c\/div\u003e","brand":"bower studio","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":45178818723923,"sku":null,"price":22.0,"currency_code":"AUD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0689\/0268\/2707\/files\/Yourparagraphtext-2026-06-03T140525.135.png?v=1780459537"}],"url":"https:\/\/bowerbooks.com\/collections\/erotic-obsessive-transgressive.oembed","provider":"bower books","version":"1.0","type":"link"}