Stefen Brazulaitis, Graeme Aitken inaugural Lifetime Achievement winners at 2026 ABA bookseller and book of the year awards
The Australian Booksellers Association (ABA) has announced the winners of its 2026 Book of the Year and Bookseller of Year awards.
Also announced at the ABA Conference Gala Dinner in Canberra on 14 June were the inaugural winners of the ABA’s Lifetime Achievement in Bookselling Award, which went to Stefen Brazulaitis of Perth’s Stefen’s Books; and Graeme Aitken of the Sydney’s The Bookshop Darlinghurst, which closed at the end of 2025.
The winners in each Book of the Year category, chosen from shortlists announced in April, are:
BookData Adult Fiction Book of the Year
- Wild Dark Shore (Charlotte McConaghy, Penguin)
BookData Adult Nonfiction Book of the Year
- Always Home, Always Homesick (Hannah Kent, Picador)
Kid’s Reading Guide Children’s Book of the Year
- Here Come the Cousins (Maggie Hutchings, illus Sarah Zweck, Thames & Hudson).
Last year’s winners were Dusk (Robbie Arnott, Picador), The Season (Helen Garner, Text) and The Midwatch (Judith Rossell, Hardie Grant Children’s Publishing).
The winners in each Bookseller of the Year category, chosen from shortlists announced in May, are:
Text Publishing Bookseller of the Year
- Sarah Deasy, Avid Reader
Penguin Random House Young Bookseller of the Year
- Eleanor Dooley, Avid Reader
Hardie Grant Children’s Publishing Children’s Bookseller of the Year
- Kasey Chambers, Matilda Bookshop.
Last year’s winners were Sally Tabner (Bookseller of the Year), Sophie Wigan (Young Bookseller of the Year), and Allyx Lathrope (Children’s Bookseller of the Year).
The awards ceremony, hosted by Myf Warhurst, author of the forthcoming Middle Rage (Hachette Australia), also featured Magda Szubanski in conversation with Text Publishing publisher Michael Heyward about her forthcoming memoir I Can’t Tell You But I Will.
Category: Awards Local news
