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Emerging Writers Festival 2023 program launched

Friday, 19 May 2023
The Emerging Writers Festival (EWF) has launched its 20th anniversary program for 14–24 June, featuring nearly 200 artists in over 60 events in various locations across Melbourne. The opening night...

Ockham NZ Book Awards 2023 winners announced

Thursday, 18 May 2023
The winners of the 2023 Ockham New Zealand Book Awards have been announced. The fiction prize went to Catherine Chidgey for The Axeman’s Carnival (Te Herenga Waka University Press), a...

Davis to retire from Hardie Grant 

Thursday, 18 May 2023
Hardie Grant has announced chief operating officer (COO) Andrew Davis will retire at the end of this financial year, ending 'an enormously successful and distinguished career'. Davis joined Hardie Grant...

The Speedy Sloth to be read for NSS at new Sydney Zoo

Thursday, 18 May 2023
The Speedy Sloth (Rebecca Young, illus by Heath McKenzie, Scholastic) will be read for the 23rd National Simultaneous Storytime (NSS) event at 11am (AEST) on Wednesday, 24 May 2023, with...

PRH, Pen America file suit over Florida book bans

Thursday, 18 May 2023
In the US, Penguin Random House (PRH), together with PEN America, a group of authors and a group of parents, have filed a federal lawsuit against a Florida school district...

Miles Franklin Literary Award 2023 longlist announced

Wednesday, 17 May 2023
The longlist for the 2023 Miles Franklin Literary Award, worth $60,000, has been announced. The 11 longlisted novels are: Hopeless Kingdom (Kgshak Akec, UWAP) Limberlost (Robbie Arnott, Text) Cold Enough...

Echo acquires Thomas debut murder mystery

Wednesday, 17 May 2023
Echo Publishing has acquired world rights to Paul Thomas’s debut murder mystery The Beacon, as part of a two-book deal, via Martin Shaw at Shaw Literary. With a career as...

WA Premier’s Book Awards shortlists announced

Tuesday, 16 May 2023
The shortlists for the 2023 Western Australian Premier’s Book Awards have been announced. The shortlisted books in each category are: The Western Australian Writer's Fellowship ($60,000) Carolyn Wadley Dowley Madison...

ALS Gold Medal 2023 longlist announced

Tuesday, 16 May 2023
The longlist for the 2023 Australian Literature Society (ALS) Gold Medal has been announced. The longlisted works are: Limberlost (Robbie Arnott, Text) Cold Enough for Snow (Jessica Au, Giramondo) Daisy...

Australian authors on Daggers shortlist

Tuesday, 16 May 2023
In the UK, the Crime Writers’ Association (CWA) has announced the shortlists for its Dagger Awards. Authors from Australia are among those shortlisted for the annual crime writing awards. Hayley...

NewSouth acquires Kean science book 

Tuesday, 16 May 2023
NewSouth has acquired world rights to science writer Zoe Kean’s popular science title Why are we like this? What can scuba diving at Shark Bay uncover about the evolution of...

Every Version of You optioned for film 

Monday, 15 May 2023
Cognito Entertainment, a new independent film and television production company launched last week in the United States, has optioned Every Version of You (Grace Chan, Affirm) for adaptation into an international...

Anaxagorou wins Ondaatje prize

Monday, 15 May 2023
In the UK, British-Cypriot poet Anthony Anaxagorou has won the Royal Society of Literature’s (RSL) £10,000 (A$18,730) Ondaatje prize for his collection Heritage Aesthetics (Granta), reports the Guardian. Heritage Aesthetics...

Dunn appointed distribution director at ADS 

Monday, 15 May 2023
Riikka Dunn has been appointed distribution director at Alliance Distribution Services (ADS). Dunn, who started at ADS on Monday, 8 May, joins the business from Ikea, where she gained experience...

Ifeakandu wins Dylan Thomas Prize

Friday, 12 May 2023
In the UK, Nigerian author Arinze Ifeakandu has been awarded the £20,000 (A$37,350) Swansea University Dylan Thomas Prize for his debut God’s Children Are Little Broken Things (W&N). Judges praised the...

The Speechwriter wins Russell Prize for Humour Writing

Friday, 12 May 2023
Martin McKenzie-Murray’s 'savage, dark and uproariously funny’ satirical memoir The Speechwriter (Scribe) has won the $10,000 biennial Russell Prize for Humour Writing, Australia’s only humour writing prize. McKenzie-Murray’s fictional debut...

Reid, Ell win 2022 Anne Elder Award

Thursday, 11 May 2023
Australian Poetry has announced Harry Reid’s Leave Me Alone (Cordite Books) and Theodore Ell’s Beginning In Sight (RWP) as the joint winners of the 2022 Anne Elder Award for a first book...

Neurodivergence and editing: An inside view  

Wednesday, 10 May 2023
In part one of an edited extract from their paper Neurodivergence and editing: An inside view, delivered at this year's IPEd conference, Louise Merrington AE and Tanja Gardner outline the...

New Dawn sales and distribution to Affirm 

Wednesday, 10 May 2023
Perth-based publisher New Dawn Publishing has signed a sales and distribution agreement with Affirm Press. The publisher of speculative fiction was founded in September 2021 by Dylan Ingram with an...

TikTok owner flags move into publishing

Wednesday, 10 May 2023
TikTok owner ByteDance has filed a US trademark application for a book-publishing entity called 8th Note Press, reports Business Insider. The company has also begun recruiting staff for publishing roles,...