Melbourne Books scam; ARA Historical Novel Prize winners; ASA, APA, authors speak to Senate committee about copyright

Local news

In local news this week, Melbourne Books has alerted writers to a vanity publisher with a similar name, Melbourne Book Publisher, which has been impersonating its business; Overland announced essayist, editor and critic Cher Tan as its new managing editor, taking over from Natasha Seymour, who is leaving the journal after seven years; Mornington Peninsula bookshop Farrells won the Love Your Bookshop Day (LYBD) award for the best window display; and Boy Swallows Universe by Trent Dalton (Fourth Estate, 2018) took first place in ABC Radio National’s Top 100 Books of the Twenty-First Century poll.

Two new literary magazines were announced this week: Varnish, a new Australian literary journal that aims to publish “evocative written art with timeless beauty”; and transitive rag, a journal for trans and gender-diverse creativity, which has launched its first issue.

And the Australian Library and Information Association announced Luna Roo the Kangaroo Baller (Adam Jackson and Adrian Lloyd, illus by Jake A Minton, Little Book Press) as the National Simultaneous Storytime book for 2026.

Awards

In awards, Robbie Arnott and Tasma Walton will share the $100,000 ARA Historical Novel Prize in the adult category for their works Dusk (Picador) and I Am Nannertgarrook (Bundyi) respectively, while Suzanne Leal has won the $30,000 children and young adult category for The Year We Escaped (HarperCollins).

Poet, writer, and academic David Brooks won the $20,000 Patrick White Literary Award for 2025; the Walkley Foundation announced the finalists for the 70th annual Walkley Awards for Excellence in Journalism; Hachette Australia and the Emerging Writers’ Festival announced the shortlist for the 2025 Richell Prize for Emerging Writers; the University of Queensland Press announced a shortlist of 5 for its inaugural mentorship prize for under-represented writers; Magabala Books was announced as the winner of the Workplace Team Culture & Inclusivity Award at the 2025 Broome Business Excellence Awards; and Australian author Luke Icarus Simon has been named a quarter finalist in the Publishers Weekly BookLife Prize – Fiction for his novel The Art in My Palm (self-published).

In Aotearoa New Zealand, the New Zealand Society of Authors Te Puni Kaituhi O Aotearoa announced Breton Dukes as the recipient of the NZSA Peter and Dianne Beatson Fellowship 2025, worth NZ$10,000; Becky Manawatu (Ngāi Tahu, Ngāti Māmoe, Waitaha) was awarded the 2025 Keri Hulme Award for Kataraina (The Cube Press) as part of the biennial Pikihuia awards; Lynn Jenner was announced as the winner of the 2025 Kathleen Grattan Poetry Award for her manuscript The Gum Trees of Kerikeri; and literary journal Landfall Tauraka has announced Tasmin Prichard as the winner of this year’s Landfall Tauraka Essay Prize for their essay “Four Hours in the Dark, Forgetting”, a “quiet and intimate retelling of their experience undergoing gender-affirming top surgery”.

Features

A flurry of features this week included B+P and the Melbourne UNESCO City of Literature Office speaking with Baghdad’s Bayt Al-Hikma Library (House of Wisdom) and Sarah Gory and Angela Meyer sharing their findings on sustainability in the publishing industry and how this research is incorporated into their tertiary teaching.

Also this week, B+P’s Andrew Wrathall, who attended last month’s International ISBN Agency annual general meeting in Brazil, reported on NielsenIQ’s presentation of its latest figures on the Brazilian book market; and B+P shared an overview of the Australian Society of Authors, the Australian Publishers Association and multiple authors speaking to a Senate committee at Parliament House about the importance of protecting copyright.

Events

The Australian Short Story Festival announced its 2025 program, which will run from 21 to 23 November; Hachette Australia announced an OutWOMAN+ panel discussion in collaboration with Out Leadership, a global platform aiming to promote LGBTQ+ equality, to run on 21 October; and Dymocks announced an anniversary lunch and panel discussion on the future of children’s literacy, to celebrate the 25th anniversary of Dymocks Children’s Charities

Acquisitions

In acquisitions news, University of Queensland Press (UQP) acquired world rights for Blue Giant by writer and filmmaker Jordan Prosser; Murdoch Books acquired world rights to Screen Wise by Madonna King; Ventura Press acquired world rights to The Rising, a police procedural crime novel by journalist Whitney Fitzsimmons; and Allen & Unwin (A&U) acquired world English rights to Delicious, a memoir “celebrating food and friendship” by author and journalist Kate Legge.

In children’s and young adult acquisitions, Wombat Books acquired world rights to Miles Thorne and the Forbidden Magic by Rebecca Ahola; Magabala Books acquired world rights to Ruby’s Web, a middle-grade novel by Ellen van Neerven; and MidnightSun acquired world rights to Big Brother Brody, a zombie apocalypse YA novel by Benjamin John Ryan.

UK-based Flame Tree Publishing acquired world rights to Sauuti Terrors, two speculative fiction anthologies coedited by Eugen Bacon, Stephen Embleton and Cheryl S Ntumy, in a deal brokered by Bieke van Aggelen of the African Literary Agency.

World news

The Frankfurt Book Fair has wound up for this year, and reports on the proceedings have come from the UK via the Bookseller and the US via Publishers Weekly. UK’s Pan Macmillan CEO, Joanna Prior, said, “There have definitely been big books and auctions going on.” US-based Schiffer Publishing CEO Peter Schiffer said, “This was the first fair where I had someone tell me to ‘go ahead and use AI’ to translate my book.”

In further international news, ThomsonReuters was named the world’s largest publisher, reported Publishers Weekly; during the Frankfurt Book Fair, DK announced a new LEGO fiction series to be published by DK’s new imprint, DK flip, reported BookBrunch; the Sharjah International Book Fair, running from 5 to 16 November, announced its 2025 theme will be “Between You and a Book”, BookBrunch reported.

In sad news this week, author Baek Sehee has died at the age of 35, reported BookBrunch. Sehee compiled conversations with her therapist into the memoir I Want to Die But I Want to Eat Tteokbokki (Bloomsbury, 2023). The Korean organ donation authority reported that Sehee saved five lives through her organ donation.

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Category: This week’s news