News | Books+Publishing

Peninsula Records and Books opens on the Yorke Peninsula

Tuesday, 25 February 2025
Peninsula Records and Books has opened a shopfront in Stansbury on the Yorke Peninsula in South Australia, with a selection of books ‘exclusively focused on Australian authors, supporting both iconic...

NZ Booklovers Awards 2025 shortlists announced

Monday, 24 February 2025
The NZ Booklovers Awards 2025 shortlists have been announced by the organisation. Shortlisted titles include: Best Adult Fiction Book Award Better Left Dead (Catherine Lea, Bateman Books) The Call (Gavin Strawhan,...

Affirm acquires new Brissenden crime novel

Monday, 24 February 2025
Affirm Press has acquired ANZ rights to Michael Brissenden’s upcoming outback noir crime thriller, Dust, via literary agent Daniel Pilkington. Set in the remote Australian town of Lake Herrod, Dust...

2025 International Prize for Arabic Fiction shortlist announced

Monday, 24 February 2025
The committee for the International Prize for Arabic Fiction (IPAF) has announced its 2025 shortlisted titles, chosen from a longlist of 16. Shortlisted titles include: The Andalusian Messiah (Taissier Khalaf,...

Readings to open Chadstone shop

Monday, 24 February 2025
Melbourne independent bookselling chain Readings has announced the business will open a new shop at Melbourne’s Chadstone Shopping Centre in late March. The store will be managed by Belle Katavatis,...

Stewart wins 2025 MUD Literary Prize

Monday, 24 February 2025
Cameron Stewart's Why Do Horses Run? (Allen & Unwin) has been announced as the 2025 winner of the $10,000 MUD Literary Prize. The prize, now in its eighth year, is...

Major wins 2025 Louie Award

Thursday, 20 February 2025
The Australian Crime Writers Association (ACWA) has named KT Major as the winner of the 2025 Louie Award, worth $500, for her story 'Bitter'. The judges also highly commended two...

Kill Your Darlings announces new flash fiction prize

Thursday, 20 February 2025
Kill Your Darlings (KYD) has announced an inaugural flash fiction prize. Open to KYD members for submissions of previously unpublished flash fiction stories, the prize 'challenges writers to be faster,...

Bonnier names new CEOs

Thursday, 20 February 2025
Bonnier Books UK has named Sarah Benton and Jonathan Perdoni as joint CEOs of the organisation, reports BookBrunch. These appointments follow yesterday's announcement of the upcoming departure of current Bonnier CEO...

A&U acquires Kirk debut fiction

Thursday, 20 February 2025
Allen & Unwin (A&U) has acquired ANZ rights to Eleanor Kirk’s debut novel, Very Impressive for Your Age, in a deal brokered by Grace Heifetz at a4 Literary. ‘Twenty-six-year-old Evelyn is...

Text acquires new Winkler fiction

Thursday, 20 February 2025
Text has acquired world rights for Griefdogg by Michael Winkler. The novel introduces Jeffrey Watson-Johnson, a hydrologist living with his wife, Martine, and child, Reggie, in Mildura. After inheriting a...

Publishers on Christmas 2024 and what they expect from the year ahead

Wednesday, 19 February 2025
Christmas 2024 sales were ‘close to expectations’ for the majority of publishers that responded to Books+Publishing’s annual Christmas survey. In addition to local independents including Allen & Unwin, Books+Publishing received...

OverDrive – ‘libraries can create new readers’

Wednesday, 19 February 2025
In the lead-up to the 2025 ABIAs, Books+Publishing is in conversation with the event's major sponsors about the status of the industry, what excites them about the future, and what they have...

Mann announced as incoming CEO S&S International

Wednesday, 19 February 2025
Ian Chapman will step down as CEO and publisher of Simon & Schuster (S&S) UK and International in May, after 25 years with the organisation. He will be replaced in...

Hachette acquires two crime novels from Papathanasiou

Wednesday, 19 February 2025
MacLehose Press, an imprint of Hachette imprint Quercus, has acquired world rights to two new crime novels by Peter Papathanasiou in a deal brokered by Martin Shaw at Shaw Literary....

Summit Books acquires new Lee fiction

Wednesday, 19 February 2025
Simon & Schuster (S&S) imprint Summit Books has acquired ANZ rights to Bri Lee’s second novel, Seed, from agent Grace Heifetz at a4 Literary. The novel introduces Mitchell and Frances,...

Knox longlisted for 2025 Walter Scott Prize

Wednesday, 19 February 2025
In the UK, the Abbotsford Trust has announced the longlist for the 16th Walter Scott Prize for Historical Fiction (WSP). Among those longlisted is local author Malcolm Knox for his...

S&S Australia launches Atria imprint

Wednesday, 19 February 2025
Simon & Schuster (S&S) Australia has announced the launch of new imprint Atria Books Australia, to be led by publisher Anthea Bariamis. Atria Books is already an imprint with S&S...

Jessica Stanley recommends

Tuesday, 18 February 2025
I’m reading a book about psychotherapy called The Talking Cure, published by Macmillan in 2019. One of the authors has a therapy podcast I’m obsessed with called Three Associating (I...

Jessica Stanley on ‘Consider Yourself Kissed’

Tuesday, 18 February 2025
London-based Australian writer Jessica Stanley (A Great Hope) returns with Consider Yourself Kissed (Text, April), a compelling novel about love, identity and modern motherhood. Books+Publishing reviewer Emily Westmoreland calls it...

Hachette reports ‘remarkable momentum’ in 2024

Tuesday, 18 February 2025
Hachette parent company Lagardère reported that for 2024, Lagardère’s publishing revenue was up 2.2% compared to 2023, with like-for-like change up 1.9% (attributable chiefly to a positive currency effect) and...

Stricker wins 2025 Peter Porter Poetry Prize

Tuesday, 18 February 2025
Meredith Stricker was awarded the 2025 Peter Porter Poetry Prize, run by the Australian Book Review (ABR) and worth $6000, at a ceremony in Melbourne last night. ABR outgoing editor Peter...

Program announcements: Newcastle Writers Festival; Whitsundays Writers Festival

Tuesday, 18 February 2025
Newcastle Writers Festival (NWF) has announced its full festival program, which will run 4–6 April. Established in 2013, NWF also oversees the Fresh Ink Emerging Writers Prize for regional NSW...

Atlantic acquires Stephens debut

Tuesday, 18 February 2025
Atlantic Books Australia, a division of Allen & Unwin (A&U), has acquired ANZ rights to Clare Stephens’s debut novel The Worst Thing I’ve Ever Done, in a deal brokered by...

Creative Australia announces 2025 VIPs

Monday, 17 February 2025
Creative Australia has announced the 12 international publishers, editors and agents participating in the 2025 Visiting International Publishers (VIPs) program. This year’s participants represent ‘a range of territories; genre specialties;...