Long-term appeal: Marketing a series
7 November 2019
How—and to whom—do publishers market books as part of series? Bec Kavanagh spoke to Hardie Grant Egmont and Scholastic about their approaches to creating buzz that transforms into longevity. In two...
Among the animals: Donna Mazza on ‘Fauna’
31 October 2019
Donna Mazza’s novel Fauna (A&U, February) is set in a near-future in which a woman is enticed into an experimental program that mixes her embryo with genetically edited cells. Reviewer...
Climate change and MBS books popular at nonfiction-focused Frankfurt 2019
30 October 2019
Nonfiction titles dominated this year’s Frankfurt Book Fair (16–20 October), with books on climate change and Mind Body Spirit (MBS) in demand, according to a number of Australian publishers who...
Justin Ractliffe on reaching heavy and light readers
30 October 2019
Penguin Random House ANZ publishing director Justin Ractliffe travelled to the United States earlier in 2019 to study consumer insights and data as part of his Copyright Agency Cultural Fund...
Best book forward: 2020 fiction preview
30 October 2019
New books by Evie Wyld, Kate Mildenhall, Alice Pung and Jamie Marina Lau are among next year’s most anticipated releases. Sarah Farquharson rounds up the best locally authored fiction and...
Remember, remember the 10th of September: Release day for ‘The Testaments’
23 October 2019
Three retailers share how their release-day strategies panned out for this year’s biggest release: Margaret Atwood’s The Testaments (Vintage). The sweet spot In Fremantle, New Edition bookseller Kristy Diffey has...
2020 vision: Kids’ and YA title preview
23 October 2019
New books from favourites including Melina Marchetta, Sally Morgan and Jessica Townsend are slated for 2020 publication, alongside debuts by Danielle Binks and Georgina Young that are already generating buzz....
Brexit, bookselling and ‘Boy Swallows Universe’: An interview with Charlie Redmayne
16 October 2019
Charlie Redmayne is CEO of HarperCollins UK, with responsibility for the UK, Ireland, India and Australia. He joined HarperCollins as group digital director, but left the business in 2011 to...
Taking stock: Hachette’s Next Stock Date system
15 October 2019
Hachette’s Next Stock Date system aims to provide booksellers with timely, accurate data. After spending more than two years developing it, Hachette has offered to share what they’ve learned with...
Book designer spotlight: Imogen Stubbs
15 October 2019
A love of publishing sparked by the Professional Writing and Editing course at RMIT led to studying graphic design, eventually landing Imogen Stubbs a job at Text Publishing, where she...
All bases covered: Karys McEwen on book design
9 October 2019
Karys McEwen discusses the subtle ways that book design impacts students and librarians. Book design is not something that I spend a lot of time considering, or at least that...
Australian novels, international rights—what’s the story? Part three
9 October 2019
In the lead-up to the Frankfurt Book Fair on 16–21 October, Books+Publishing is publishing a three-part feature on Australian fiction rights sales by researcher Airlie Lawson. A PhD candidate at the Australian National...
Quiet achiever: Jessica Horrocks’ career journey
9 October 2019
Jessica Horrocks, designer and production coordinator at Text Publishing, was recently named Emerging Designer of the Year at the 2019 Australian Book Design Awards. She shares her career journey. Having...
Australian novels, international rights: What’s the story? Part two
2 October 2019
In the lead-up to the Frankfurt Book Fair on 16–21 October, Books+Publishing is publishing a three-part feature on Australian fiction rights sales by researcher Airlie Lawson. A PhD candidate at...
The information age: Children’s reference books
2 October 2019
In a time of internet fatigue, young readers are turning back to books as authoritative sources of information. Danielle Binks investigates. George Orwell is said to have stated, ‘In a...
Book designer spotlight: Michelle Mackintosh
2 October 2019
Michelle Mackintosh is a freelance book designer, as well as a writer, illustrator and Japanophile (she’s co-written four books on Japan with her husband, writer and DJ Steve Wide). She...
Jane Harrison on Blak & Bright
25 September 2019
This year’s Blak & Bright festival—the second after the inaugural festival in 2016—ran from 5–8 September in Melbourne. The festival had about 2500 people attend its sessions, up from the...
Australian novels, international rights: What’s the story? Part one
25 September 2019
In the lead-up to the Frankfurt Book Fair on 16–21 October, Books+Publishing is publishing a three-part feature on Australian fiction rights sales by researcher Airlie Lawson. A PhD candidate at...
Book designer spotlight: Hazel Lam
25 September 2019
Hazel Lam began her career as a motion graphics designer before moving into publishing, and has spent the past six years working for HarperCollins. Her cover for The Lost Flowers...
Book industry orgs support climate strike
18 September 2019
Booksellers, publishers and other industry organisations across Australia are participating in the global climate strike, taking place on Friday, 20 September. With almost 100 locations across Australia registered to strike,...
Drawn to writing: Rove McManus on ‘Disgusting McGrossface’
18 September 2019
Aussie television personality Rove McManus makes his foray into children’s books with picture book Disgusting McGrossface (Scholastic, September) and younger readers novel Rocky Lobstar (Scholastic, October). Kelsey Oldham spoke to...
Book designer spotlight: Hannah Janzen
18 September 2019
Hannah Janzen began designing books at Sydney design studio Xou Creative, before turning to freelance, specialising in children’s books. She was recently elected president of the Australian Book Designers Association...
Book designer spotlight: Sarah Davis
11 September 2019
After working for over a decade as a freelance picture book illustrator and designer, Sarah Davies joined Walker Books Australia as associate art director. She spoke to Books+Publishing for our ‘book...
We don’t need a map: The growth in illustrated travel titles
11 September 2019
Travellers are looking beyond traditional guidebooks for recommendations and inspiration—and publishers are finding new niche audiences in a shifting travel market. Andrea Hanke investigates the growth in illustrated travel titles....
Scaling new heights: H M Waugh on ‘The Lost Stone of SkyCity’
5 September 2019
H M Waugh’s middle-grade fantasy The Lost Stone of SkyCity (Fremantle Press, October) is set in the mountainous worlds of the Dirt and the Ice. Reviewer Catherine Moller spoke to...
Nine million books in Beijing: Jane Curry on the Beijing International Book Fair
4 September 2019
Ventura Press founder and publisher Jane Curry attended this year's Beijing International Book Fair, which ran from 21–25 August. I am writing these words as I prepare to fly home...
Place of exchange: Jane Stratton on Lost in Books
4 September 2019
Lost in Books is a multilingual children’s bookshop in Fairfield, Sydney. A project of the Think+Do Tank Foundation, the shop’s mission is to celebrate and support multilingual literacy and creativity....
Book designer spotlight: Andy Warren
4 September 2019
Andy Warren began his career at Hardie Grant before moving exclusively into children’s books at Five Mile. His recent designs include an award-winning range of publications celebrating Barbie’s 60th birthday....
Following the impulse: Anna Krien on ‘Act of Grace’
29 August 2019
Almost a decade in the making, Anna Krien’s debut novel, Act of Grace (Black Inc., October), is described by reviewer Brad Jefferies as ‘an ambitious and compelling study of trauma’....
Puffin grants in New Zealand
28 August 2019
As part of Puffin’s upcoming 80th anniversary, the publisher offered grants valuing up to NZ$5000 each to bookstores to fund initiatives to get kids reading. Brad Jefferies chatted to three...
