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Wright shortlisted for 2024 James Tait Black Prize

Cover of Praiseworthy Wednesday, 27 March 2024
Praiseworthy by Alexis Wright (Giramondo) has been shortlisted for the fiction award in the 2024 James Tait Black Prizes. The works shortlisted for the fiction and biography prizes, each worth...

Walker acquires Zaslavsky nonfiction ‘Splodge!’ 

Photograph of Alice Zaslavsky Wednesday, 27 March 2024
Walker Books has acquired world rights to Splodge!, a middle-grade nonfiction book from cookbook author and media personality Alice Zaslavsky. The publisher said that this book ‘will look at everyone’s...

Wright shortlisted for 2024 Dublin Literary Award

Photograph of Alexis Wright Wednesday, 27 March 2024
Alexis Wright has been shortlisted for the €100,000 (A$166,000) International Dublin Literary Award, the world’s most valuable annual prize for a single work of fiction written in or translated into...

Pantera acquires Earp debut novel 

Photograph of Joseph Earp sitting in a chair in front of a window Wednesday, 27 March 2024
Pantera has acquired ANZ rights to Painting Portraits of Everyone I’ve Ever Dated, a debut novel by Joseph Earp, in a deal brokered by Jeanne Ryckmans at Key People Literary...

Booktique to open store in Albury

Wednesday, 27 March 2024
Booktique—an independent bookshop currently operating in Wangaratta, Victoria—is opening a second store in Albury, NSW. Michelle Delle Vergin, who owns both stores with husband Mark Bolsius, said that for the...

Copyright Licensing New Zealand launches IP platform 

Tuesday, 26 March 2024
In Aotearoa New Zealand, not-for-profit organisation Copyright Licensing New Zealand (CLNZ) has launched a platform to support creative workers to ‘better manage their intellectual property’. The platform, called MyCreativeRights, is...

Murray awarded 2024 Boundless mentorship

Photograph of Kalem Murray Monday, 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

Photograph of Svetlana Sterlin Monday, 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Meanjin (Brisbane) poet Svetlana Sterlin has won the 2023 Helen Anne Bell Poetry Bequest Award for her unpublished book-length collection ‘If Movement Were a Language’.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...

Blake Poetry Prize 2024 shortlist announced

Monday, 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...

Brisbane Writers Festival releases 2024 program

Brisbane Writers Festival 2024 banner Monday, 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

Author photograph of Vivan Pham Monday, 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

MWF logo Friday, 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

Thursday, 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,...

Good Thing Productions acquires ‘Cherrywood’ screen rights 

Cover of Cherrywood by Jock Serong Wednesday, 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...

The Bookshop Bowral and Kiama to change hands 

Wednesday, 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 

Wednesday, 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

CBCA shortlist Tuesday, 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

Tuesday, 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 

Tuesday, 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...

Auckland Writers Festival program announced

Monday, 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 

Monday, 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...