Murray awarded 2024 Boundless mentorship
25 March 2024
Bardi writer Kalem Murray is the winner of the 2024 Boundless Indigenous Writer’s Mentorship, presented by Text Publishing and Writing NSW with the support of the First Nations Australia Writers...
Sterlin wins Helen Anne Bell Poetry Bequest Award
25 March 2024
Meanjin (Brisbane) poet Svetlana Sterlin has won the 2023 Helen Anne Bell Poetry Bequest Award for her unpublished book-length collection ‘If Movement Were a Language’. Selected from a shortlist of...
Scribner acquires Beecher’s ‘The Men Who Killed the News’
25 March 2024
Simon & Schuster Australia (S&S) has acquired world rights to The Men Who Killed the News by Crikey publisher Eric Beecher under its Scribner imprint. This work of nonfiction is...
Blake Poetry Prize 2024 shortlist announced
25 March 2024
Casula Powerhouse Arts Centre, in collaboration with WestWords, has announced the shortlist for the 68th Blake Poetry Prize, worth $5000. The Blake Prize is an open poetry prize that ‘challenges...
QBD named in Deloitte’s Best Managed Companies program
25 March 2024
Bookselling chain QBD has been named as one of Australia’s Best Managed Companies in an award program run by Deloitte Australia. Accepting the award on behalf of the organisation, QBD...
Brisbane Writers Festival releases 2024 program
25 March 2024
The Brisbane Writers Festival (BWF) has launched its 2024 program, which will run from 30 May until 2 June. Over 150 live events are planned for the 2024 festival, with...
Pham named UTS writer in residence
25 March 2024
Vietnamese-Australian novelist, essayist and poet Vivian Pham has been awarded the Copyright Agency–UTS New Writer in Residence fellowship for 2024. Pham is the author of the novel The Coconut Children...
Full 2024 MWF program announced
22 March 2024
Melbourne Writers Festival (MWF) has launched the full program for its 2024 festival, to be held in venues across the Melbourne CBD and surrounds from 6 to 12 May. Outgoing MWF...
ABIAs 2024 shortlists announced
21 March 2024
The Australian Publishers Association (APA) has announced the shortlists for the 2024 Australian Book Industry Awards (ABIAs). The APA will announce the business awards shortlists, including the categories of publisher,...
Dick and Joan Green Family Award for Tasmanian History longlist
21 March 2024
The longlist has been announced for the 2024 Dick and Joan Green Family Award for Tasmanian History, worth $25,000. The longlisted works are: Limberlost (Robbie Arnott, Text) Dogs in Van...
Helen Anne Bell Poetry Bequest Award shortlist announced
21 March 2024
The University of Sydney’s faculty of arts and social sciences has announced the shortlist for the Helen Anne Bell Poetry Bequest Award for 2023. The Helen Anne Bell Poetry Bequest...
Good Thing Productions acquires ‘Cherrywood’ screen rights
20 March 2024
Screen rights to the forthcoming novel Cherrywood by Jock Serong (Fourth Estate) have been optioned by Good Thing Productions, via Melanie Ostell Literary. Good Thing Productions’ recent screen projects include Nitram and Nude...
Maguire’s historical fiction ‘Rapture’ sells to Sceptre
20 March 2024
In the UK, Sceptre has acquired world rights (ex ANZ) to Rapture, the first historical novel from Emily Maguire (Allen & Unwin), about the legend of Pope Joan, via Grace...
Hachette signs Pei Yin’s ‘When Sleeping Women Wake’
20 March 2024
In a joint acquisition, Hachette Australia and Quercus UK have secured UK and Commonwealth rights at auction for Canberra author Emma Pei Yin’s debut novel When Sleeping Women Wake, in...
The Bookshop Bowral and Kiama to change hands
20 March 2024
Marie Fitzpatrick, of The Bookshop Bowral and Kiama, has announced that the bookshops have been purchased by Clare Meldrum, and that the current owners will depart next month. Fitzpatrick said...
Woehlert and Lake list Imprint Booksellers for sale
20 March 2024
Katherine Woehlert and Jason Lake, proprietors of Adelaide bookstore Imprints Booksellers, have placed the business on the market. In a statement shared on the bookstore’s Facebook page earlier this month,...
CBCA 2024 shortlists announced
19 March 2024
The Children’s Book Council of Australia (CBCA) has announced its shortlist for the 2024 CBCA Book of the Year Awards. The shortlisted books in each category, selected from the 2024...
Skate appointed Writers Victoria CEO
19 March 2024
Writers Victoria has appointed Julie Skate as its new CEO. Skate takes over the role from Lucy Hamilton, who in February announced she would depart after three-and-a-half years with the...
Pantera acquires Wright fantasy debut
19 March 2024
Pantera Press has acquired Skysong, a fantasy novel by debut author C A Wright. Skysong is a ‘beautiful, lyrical retelling of Hans Christian Andersen’s The Nightingale’ that follows Oriane, a...
North American rights sold for Rogers’ ‘The Heart Is a Star’
19 March 2024
North American rights to The Heart Is a Star (Megan Rogers, HarperCollins) have been sold in a pre-empt to Central Avenue Publishing by Benython Oldfield at Zeitgeist Agency. The novel—Rogers’...
Auckland Writers Festival program announced
18 March 2024
The program for the Auckland Writers Festival, which will run 14–19 May 2024, has been announced. Fiction headliners include prize-winning novelist Ann Patchett; international bestselling author Celeste Ng; Pulitzer Prize–winning...
Yarros tops 2023 ebook charts
18 March 2024
Rebecca Yarros’ romantasy titles Fourth Wing and Iron Flame (both Piatkus) have taken out the top two places in Nielsen BookScan’s 2023 ebook charts—and the second and third place overall...
Aurealis Awards shortlists announced
18 March 2024
The shortlists for the 2023 Aurealis Awards, presented for science fiction, fantasy and horror writing in Australia, have been announced. Among longer-form works shortlisted for this year’s awards are: Best...
Local publishers nominated for Bologna Prize
14 March 2024
Australian publishers Affirm Press, Fremantle Press and Hardie Grant Children's Publishing and Aotearoa New Zealand publishers Scholastic New Zealand and Huia Publishers have been shortlisted for this year’s Bologna Prize...
Affirm Press signs Sweatshop mentees Nour and Barnette
14 March 2024
Affirm Press has acquired world rights to books by Egyptian-Australian writer and journalist Daniel Nour and African-American Australian writer Tyree Barnette. Nour and Barnette were recipients of the 2021 Affirm...
Fullagar wins 2024 Hazel Rowley Literary Fellowship
14 March 2024
Social and cultural historian Kate Fullagar is the winner of the 2024 Hazel Rowley Literary Fellowship, worth $20,000. Fullagar was awarded the fellowship for her proposed biography, ‘The Secret Life...
S&S acquires three titles by Heiss
14 March 2024
Simon & Schuster Australia (S&S) has acquired world rights to three new books by Anita Heiss, via Tara Wynne of Curtis Brown Australia. The first book, which has the working...
Christmas Press acquires Kelleher SF novel ‘The Lastling’
13 March 2024
Christmas Press has acquired world rights to The Lastling, a science fiction novel for upper middle-grade readers by Victor Kelleher, via Margaret Connolly of Margaret Connolly and Associates. The Lastling,...
Larrikin House acquires ‘I Can’t Believe…’ nonfiction series
13 March 2024
Larrikin House has acquired world rights to a nonfiction series with multiple authors, including John Larkin, Cristy Burne, Louise Park and George Ivanoff, to be illustrated by Jules Faber. The...
Hachette acquires Paris debut ‘The Unravelling’ in two-book deal
13 March 2024
Hachette Australia and Hachette New Zealand have acquired world rights to The Unravelling, a debut novel from Rachel Paris, in a six-figure two-book deal. Describing the book, Hachette said it...
