Peter Craven's Best Books for Summer 2008-09

Alice Schroeder, The Snowball: Warren Buffett and the Business of Life (Bloomsbury, 976pp; $49.95).

Barack Obama, Dreams from My Father, read by the author (Text Publishing, 6 CDs; $39.95).

Helen Garner, The Spare Room (Text Publishing, 208pp; $29.95).

Christos Tsiolkas, The Slap (Allen & Unwin, 496pp; $32.95).

Tim Winton, Breath (Hamish Hamilton, 224pp; $45).

Murray Bail, The Pages (Text Publishing, 208pp; $34.95).

Kate Grenville, The Lieutenant (Text Publishing, 320pp; $45).

Nam Le, The Boat (Hamish Hamilton, 336pp; $29.95).

Julia Leigh, Disquiet (Hamish Hamilton, 120pp; $29.95).

Toni Morrison, A Mercy (Chatto & Windus, 165pp; $39.95).

John Updike, The Widows of Eastwick (Hamish Hamilton, 320pp; $32.95).

Philip Roth, Indignation (Jonathan Cape, 256pp; $45).

Joyce Carol Oates, My Sister, My Love (Fourth Estate, 576pp; $33).

Chloe Hooper, The Tall Man (Hamish Hamilton, 288pp; $32.95).

Peter Costello, The Costello Memoirs (Melbourne University Publishing, 374pp; $55).

Brian Matthews, Manning Clark: A Life (Allen & Unwin, 450pp; $59.95).

Christina Thompson, Come on Shore and We Will Kill and Eat You All (Bloomsbury, 288pp; $29.95).

George Steiner, My Unwritten Books (Weidenfeld & Nicolson, 224pp; $40).

Evelyn Juers, House of Exile: The Life and Times of Heinrich Mann and Nelly Kroeger-Mann (Giramondo Publishing, 352pp; $32.95).

Andrea Weiss, In the Shadow of the Magic Mountain: The Erika and Klaus Mann Story (University of Chicago Press, 310pp; import).

Shirley Hazzard and Francis Steegmuller, The Ancient Shore: Dispatches from Naples (University of Chicago Press, 144pp; import).

Penelope Fitzgerald, So I Have Thought of You: The Letters of Penelope Fitzgerald (Fourth Estate, 624pp; $60).

Manning Clark, Ever, Manning: Selected Letters of Manning Clark, 1938-1991, edited by Roslyn Russell (Allen & Unwin, 576pp; $65).

Dirk Bogarde, Ever, Dirk: The Bogarde Letters (Weidenfeld & Nicolson, 536pp; $65).

Sean Connery, Being a Scot (Weidenfeld & Nicolson, 312pp; $40).

Roger Moore, My Word is My Bond (HarperCollins, 400pp; $50).

James Davidson, The Greeks and Greek Love: A Radical Reappraisal of Homosexuality in Ancient Greece (Weidenfeld & Nicolson, 656pp; $90).

Robert Dessaix, Arabesques (Picador, 320pp; $50).

Graham Freudenberg, Churchill and Australia (Macmillan, 613pp; $55).

Julie Andrews, Home: A Memoir of My Early Years (Weidenfeld & Nicolson, 384pp; $35).

Thomas Hischak, The Oxford Companion to the American Musical: Theatre, Film and Television (Oxford University Press; 592pp; $79.95).

Mary Hunter, Mozart's Operas: A Companion (Yale University Press, 354pp; import).

John O'Malley, What Happened at Vatican II (Harvard University Press, 344pp; $45.95).

Don Watson, American Journeys (Knopf, 332pp; $49.95).

Simon Schama, The American Future: A History (Jonathan Cape, 384pp; $35).

Peter Dale Scott, The Road to 9/11: Wealth, Empire and the Future of America (University of California Press, 449pp; import).

Stephenie Meyer, Breaking Dawn (Orbit, 768pp; $30).

Gregory Maguire, A Lion Among Men (Voyager, 336pp; $33).

Christopher Paolini, Brisingr (Doubleday, 765pp; $34.95).

Candace Bushnell, One Fifth Avenue (Little, Brown, 448pp; $33).

Jeffrey Archer, A Prisoner of Birth (Macmillan, 400pp; $35).

PD James, The Private Patient (Faber, 416pp; $32.95).

John le Carré, A Most Wanted Man (Hodder & Stoughton, 384pp; $33).

Sebastian Faulks, Devil May Care (Michael Joseph, 320pp; $32.95).

Apollonius of Rhodes, Argonautika, translated by Peter Green (University of California Press, 524pp; import).

Vergil, The Aeneid, translated by Sarah Ruden (Yale University Press, 320pp; import).

Robert Adamson, The Golden Bird: New and Selected Poems (Black Inc., 293pp; $27.95).

John Milton, The Essential John Milton, read by Anton Lesser, Derek Jacobi and Samantha Bond (Naxos AudioBooks, 8 CDs).

Joseph Conrad, Nostromo (unabridged), read by Nigel Anthony (Naxos AudioBooks, 15 CDs).

William Shakespeare, Othello (abridged), read by Ewan McGregor, Chiwetel Ejiofor and cast (Naxos Audiobooks, 2 CDs & 1 DVD).

William Shakespeare, The Merchant of Venice (unabridged), read by Antony Sher and cast (Naxos AudioBooks, 2 CDs).