There's no denying the attractiveness of these little essay-length books . Nor could any fair-minded person argue with the publishing brilliance of having essays of this kind by writers of this quality or of this degree of fame or interest . This is a ravishing quartet of essays, grander and more variegated than we have seen anyone bring together in ages.Peter Craven, The Australian

It's hard to think of any other essay series that could bring together the Holocaust, Aboriginal dispossession, a writer's longing for a former prime minister and a Melbourne teenager conducting Mahler in his bedroom with a plastic chopstick.Jane Sullivan, The Age

Little Books on Big Themes, re-packages an old-fashioned and unsexy genre to make essays modish and exciting.Fiona Gruber, Weekend Australian