News sections | Books+Publishing

Indigo Owl (Charlie Archbold, Wakefield)

Wednesday, 29 July 2020
Scarlet, Dylan and Rumi are new students at the Arcadia Institute, where they will receive the training required to turn them into good citizens of the corpocratic planet Galbraith. But...

The golden age of middle-grade

Wednesday, 29 July 2020
In the four years since Danielle Binks wrote about the under-representation of middle-grade literature, the genre has exploded. Now a middle-grade author herself, Binks follows up with a look at...

Booker Prize longlist, JobKeeper extended and more

Wednesday, 29 July 2020
The Booker Prize longlist—which features writers from the UK, US, Zimbabwe, Ireland and Ethiopia—headlines this week’s awards news. In local awards news, Rodney Hall and Krissy Kneen have received $80,000...

Rights round-up

Wednesday, 29 July 2020
Acquisitions Fiction Transit Lounge has acquired world English-language rights to Travelling Companions (Antoni Jach) (see news). Nonfiction Scribe has acquired world English-language rights to The Chief Witness: Escape from China’s...

Furphy Literary Award 2020 winners announced

Wednesday, 29 July 2020
The winners of the inaugural Furphy Literary Award have been announced. Ruby Todd won the $15,000 open category for her short story ‘Awakening’, chosen from a shortlist announced in early...

Aurealis Awards 2019 winners announced

Wednesday, 29 July 2020
The winners of the 2019 Aurealis Awards, presented for science fiction, fantasy and horror writing in Australia, have been announced. The winners in each category are: Best science fiction novel...

Transit Lounge acquires Jach’s ‘Travelling Companions’

Wednesday, 29 July 2020
Transit Lounge has acquired world English-language rights to Antoni Jach’s fourth novel, Travelling Companions. Publisher Barry Scott said the novel is ‘charming, amusing and philosophical. Solitary travellers and a couple...

Booker Prize 2020 longlist announced

Tuesday, 28 July 2020
The longlist for the 2020 Booker Prize has been announced. The 13 books longlisted for the £50,000 (A$90,000) prize are: The New Wilderness (Diane Cook, Oneworld) This Mournable Body (Tsitsi...

Nib Literary Award 2020 longlist announced

Tuesday, 28 July 2020
The longlist for the $20,000 Mark and Evette Moran Literary Award, known as ‘the Nib’, has been announced. The longlisted titles are: Nothing New (Robyn Annear, Text) After the Count (Stephanie Convery,...

Hall, Kneen receive $80k Copyright Agency fellowships

Tuesday, 28 July 2020
The Copyright Agency’s Cultural Fund has awarded three fellowships totalling $240,000. Writers Rodney Hall and Krissy Kneen and visual artist Khaled Sabsabi will each receive $80,000 to create new works....

Coles to offer free ‘Treehouse’ mini titles, donate to ILF

Monday, 27 July 2020
Australian supermarket chain Coles has partnered with author Andy Griffiths and illustrator Terry Denton to offer 24 pocket-sized ‘Treehouse’ titles as the chain’s new Collectables items, available from Wednesday, 29...

Read the latest Publishers Weekly

Monday, 27 July 2020
Books+Publishing is partnering with US trade news magazine Publishers Weekly to provide our subscribers with exclusive access to the weekly digital edition of PW magazine. Features include: 'Homeward bound' 'A...

UQP acquires two new books from Birch

Thursday, 23 July 2020
University of Queensland Press (UQP) has acquired a short story collection, Dark as Last Night, and a work of poetry, Whisper Songs, by Miles Franklin–shortlisted author Tony Birch. ‘Dark as...

Poly (Paul Dalgarno, Ventura)

Wednesday, 22 July 2020
Spouses Chris and Sarah are trying something new—after years without sex, but still in love and keen to remain a family unit, they’ve agreed to see other people. The confident,...

Tricky Nick (Nicholas J Johnson, illus by Russell Jeffery, Pan)

Wednesday, 22 July 2020
I’m usually suspicious of books written by performers, celebrities or adult writers turning to children’s fiction, but Tricky Nick won me over in the first 20 pages. Magician-turned-author Nicholas J...

Winch wins Miles Franklin, Nielsen predicts book sales rebound and more

Wednesday, 22 July 2020
Tara June Winch has won the 2020 Miles Franklin Literary Award for her second novel The Yield (Hamish Hamilton), becoming the fourth First Nations writer to win the award in its...

The History of Mischief (Rebecca Higgie, Fremantle Press)

Wednesday, 22 July 2020
The History of Mischief is an exploration of family, grief and the power of stories, with a pseudo-historical twist. Nine-year-old Jessie is struggling with the loss of her parents and...

Publishers need to release more work in Indigenous languages

Wednesday, 22 July 2020
'Having our languages become normalised and celebrated is going to positively affect our future generations. It will psychologically change them. Having a linguistic connection to the past doesn’t just change...

Shortlist for inaugural Matilda Children’s Literature Prize announced

Wednesday, 22 July 2020
HarperCollins Australia has announced the shortlist for the inaugural Matilda Children’s Literature Prize. The three shortlisted manuscripts are: 'Exposed' by Sandy Bigna, about a teenager who starts having strange flashbacks...