Pantera acquires Sheppard’s ‘Yeah the Boys’

Pantera Press has acquired ANZ rights for Yeah the Boys, an adult fiction title from author Holden Sheppard, via Gaby Naher at The Naher Agency.

According to the publisher, Yeah the Boys will be the sequel to Invisible Boys, which was adapted into a Stan Original series this year. It will also include crossovers with characters from Sheppard’s second and third novels, The Brink and King of Dirt.

‘[Yeah the Boys] follows the three main characters – Charlie, Zeke and Hammer – seven years after the events of the first [book],’ said the publisher. ‘No longer teenagers and now living in Perth in the mid-2020s – a long way from the red dirt and small-town scandals of their hometown of Geraldton – the boys are lost and isolated, both from one another and from the hopes and dreams that first brought them to the city.’

Sheppard is a Western Australian author. His debut, Invisible Boys, won the WA Premier’s Prize for an Emerging Writer, and his second novel, The Brink, won the 2024 Ena Noël Award. His third novel, King of Dirt, was his first book for adults.

Discussing the acquisition, Sheppard said: ‘I came up with the idea for this book many years ago, and my three previous novels have all been building to this “Into the Sheppardverse” book that unites the characters of my novelistic universe […] Yeah the Boys is the boldest and most zeitgeisty thing I’ve ever written: it’s a raw, unfiltered take on being a gay man in the 2020s, and a celebration of male bonding and camaraderie.’

Pantera Press publisher Tom Langshaw said: ‘Invisible Boys has rightly been hailed as a modern gay Australian classic, and I know plenty of people will want to know what happens next for Charlie, Zeke and Hammer. Without wanting to give spoilers, I will say that it’s been a special thing to revisit these much-loved characters as they navigate an even more complicated adult world.’

Yeah the Boys is set for release in 2026.

Category: Local news Rights and acquisitions