Szalay wins the Booker Prize; Thomas wins Nib; Ruffino steps down
Local news
In local news this week, Canberra Writers Festival recorded more than 10,000 audience attendees at its 2025 program, an increase of 55% on the 2024 festival. This year’s 5-day program included 114 events, of which 50 sold out and 24 reached 75% audience capacity.
Australian rights managers and literary agents returned from this year’s Frankfurt Book Fair (which ran from 15 to 19 October) reporting a strong sense of optimism after a packed schedule of deals, meetings, and international conversations about the future of publishing.
The Australian Publishers Association and Australian publishing staff have contributed to new international metadata standards designed to make First Nations books and publishing more consistently labelled and more easily located across the industry.
Simon & Schuster Australia managing director Dan Ruffino is stepping down from his position in December; the Awesome Black Foundation announced the Voices Rising Fund, a new initiative for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander musicians and writers; and the Indigenous Literacy Foundation announced 7 new ambassadors for 2026.
Awards
This week, historian and essayist Martin Thomas was awarded the 2025 Mark and Evette Moran Nib Literary Award, worth $40,000, for Clever Men (A&U); and Clare Wright won the Australian Political Book of the Year for Näku Dhäruk: The Bark Petitions (Text).
The State Library of Queensland announced the 2026 recipients of 6 fellowships, worth $105,000, along with 2 John Oxley Library Medals; Kill Your Darlings announced the shortlist for its 2025 KYD Creative Nonfiction Essay Prize; the Newcastle Writers Festival announced Jessie Ansons as the winner of the 2025 Fresh Ink Prize, an award for emerging writers in regional NSW; and Tabitha Carvan was awarded this year’s UNSW Press Bragg Prize for Science Writing for her essay “The Unexpected Poetry of PhD Acknowledgements”.
Features
As the Canberra Writers Festival wrap, Books+Publishing’s (B+P) former publishing director Kate Cuthbert shared her reflections on the festival as a participant and B+P representative.
B+P reviewer Lisandra Linde interviewed author Kay Kerr about Might Cry Later, Kerr’s debut adult novel, and Kerr shared her reading recommendations – Moonlight and Dust by Jasmin McGaughey and Consider Yourself Kissed by Jessica Stanley; B+P also spoke with The Bookshop, a new bookstore in Colac, Victoria; and, last but not least, B+P’s Junior Book Club ran last Friday, featuring “fun and imaginative adventures [and] books that spark curiosity and conversation” for young readers.
Meanwhile, Australian ISBN Agency representative Andrew Wrathall reported on the ISNI session at September’s International ISBN Agency annual general meeting in São Paulo.
Rights and acquisitions
In nonfiction acquisition news, Wiley acquired world rights to broadcaster Christian O’Connell’s Unscript; NewSouth Publishing acquired world rights to Foreign Return: On Art and Inhabitation, the debut literary nonfiction work by writer and cultural critic Neha Kale; Pantera Press acquired world rights to the memoir Love Like This by actor and singer Natalie Bassingthwaighte; and Affirm Press acquired world rights to Why We Garden, a new title by ABC Gardening Australia presenter Hannah Moloney.
In fiction, Affirm Press acquired world rights to Lauren Keegan’s second novel, The Woman in the Seal Skin.
Meanwhile, for younger readers, Riveted Press acquired world rights to The Midlands by Kate Gordon, in a deal brokered by Alex Adsett Literary.
Hardie Grant Children’s Publishing announced that the film adaptation of the Zac Power series is slated for release on Boxing Day 2027.
International
The major bookish news across the globe this week was the announcement that David Szalay won the 2025 Booker Prize, worth £50,000 (A$100,800), for Flesh (Jonathan Cape).
In further international news, Publishers Weekly reported that US international library wholesaler Baker & Taylor’s recent trading problems and looming closure is impacting publishers, retailers and libraries, according to several industry professionals; and, also in the US, Random House Children’s Books acquired Cherry Lake Publishing Group, a publisher of children’s trade, library, and educational titles. Meanwhile, Richard Charkin has been appointed chair of the board of Thames & Hudson Ltd in the UK, effective 1 January 2026; and the Brazilian Book Chamber announced the winner of the 2025 Jabuti Award for Brazilian Book Published Abroad.
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Category: This week’s news
