New gift imprint for Smith Street Books
17 January 2020
Smith Street Books will launch a new gift imprint in 2020. Smith Street Gift will include a range of games and memorabilia with characters and quotes from TV shows like...
PRH sells ‘The Tiny Star’ to US
17 January 2020
Penguin Random House Australia has sold North American rights to Mem Fox’s picture book The Tiny Star (illus by Freya Blackwood) to Knopf Books for Young Readers. Editorial director of...
‘Future Fit’ shortlisted for UK Business Book Award
17 January 2020
In the UK, Andrea Clarke's book Future Fit (Major Street) has been shortlisted in the 2020 Business Book Awards. Shortlisted in the International Book category, Future Fit looks at disruption and...
Wilson appointed Berbay sales and marketing manager
17 January 2020
Kirsty Wilson has been appointed sales and marketing manager at Berbay Publishing. Wilson was previously sales and marketing director at Text Publishing for 14 years. According to Berbay, sales growth...
Writers awarded OzCo international residencies for 2020–21
16 January 2020
The Australia Council has announced eight writers as recipients of international development residencies as part of its latest grants round. Lisa Gorton, Robert Lukins, Fiona McGregor and Sandra Thibodeaux will...
UQP acquires Christopher Raja memoir in ‘spirited’ auction
16 January 2020
The University of Queensland Press (UQP) has acquired world rights to a memoir by Melbourne-based author Christopher Raja, in what literary agent Martin Shaw of Alex Adsett Publishing Services described...
Australian Romance Readers Awards 2019 finalists announced
16 January 2020
The finalists for the 2019 Australian Romance Readers Awards have been announced. Six authors have been shortlisted for the favourite Australian romance author category. They are: Alissa Callen Kelly Hunter...
CBCA, Little Bookroom organise book drives for bushfire-affected children
15 January 2020
The Children’s Book Council of Australia (CBCA) in November announced a partnership with the not-for-profit Givit to raise money to buy books for children and young adults affected by the bushfire...
Lit orgs, writers receive Create NSW funding
15 January 2020
A number of literary organisations and writers are among the recipients of round one of Create NSW’s annual organisation, project and Creative Koori Projects arts funding program, which has allocated...
Text celebrates Coetzee’s 80th birthday with special collection
15 January 2020
Text Publishing will celebrate J M Coetzee’s 80th birthday with a special collection of writings in honour of the South Africa-born, Australian writer. Coetzee’s partner of more than 40 years,...
Indie Book Awards 2020 shortlists announced
15 January 2020
Leading Edge Books has announced the shortlists for the 2020 Indie Book Awards for the best Australian books published in 2019. The shortlisted titles in each category are: Fiction There...
Ventura sells UK rights to ‘Paris Savages’
15 January 2020
Ventura Press has sold UK rights to Katherine Johnson’s novel Paris Savages to independent publisher Allison and Busby. Paris Savages, which was written as part of Johnson’s PhD, is based...
A&U acquires ANZ rights to Marney’s new YA novel
15 January 2020
Allen & Unwin (A&U) has acquired ANZ rights to a new YA thriller by Ellie Marney. None Shall Sleep, which A&U described as a YA Silence of the Lambs, is...
Tumarkin shortlisted for National Book Critics Circle Awards
14 January 2020
In the US, Australian author Maria Tumarkin is a finalist in the National Book Critics Circle Awards for her book Axiomatic (Brow Books), published in the US by Transit Books....
ABR announces Peter Porter Poetry Prize 2020 shortlist
14 January 2020
The shortlist for the 2020 Australian Book Review (ABR) Peter Porter Poetry Prize has been announced. The shortlisted poems are: ‘Precision Signs’ (Lachlan Brown) ‘That Wadjela Tongue’ (Claire G Coleman)...
Writers, literary orgs among latest OzCo funding round recipients
14 January 2020
Twenty writers and seven literary organisations are among the 186 recipients of the Australia Council’s latest grants round, worth a total of $6.5 million. Funding in the literature category totalled...
ACT Book of the Year 2019 shortlist announced
14 January 2020
The shortlist for the 2019 ACT Book of the Year Award was announced in December. The shortlisted titles are: Made by Humans: The AI Condition (Ellen Broad, MUP) Book of...
UWAP announces 2020 Dorothy Hewett Award shortlist
14 January 2020
In December, UWA Publishing announced the shortlist for the 2020 Dorothy Hewett Award for an unpublished manuscript. The shortlisted authors and their works are: ‘The Sorry Tale of the Mignonette’...
MWF appoints Nair as program manager
14 January 2020
Melbourne Writers Festival (MWF) has appointed writer and critic Sonia Nair as program manager, taking over the role from Gene Smith, who has moved into the role of associate director...
MacDonald joins MUP as senior director of marketing and sales
13 January 2020
Melbourne University Publishing (MUP) has appointed Brian MacDonald as its new senior director of marketing and sales. MacDonald has moved to Melbourne from Canada, where he was the business development...
Book sales value down three percent in 2019: Nielsen
13 January 2020
After five consecutive years of marginal growth in the Australian book market, book sales fell three percent in value in Australia in 2019, down $36 million to $1.14 billion, according...
Whitmont joins Booktopia Publisher Services
13 January 2020
Booktopia has announced that Scott Whitmont will be joining Booktopia's distribution division Booktopia Publisher Services (BPS), in the role of business development and relationship manager. Whitmont was previously the owner...
UWAP staff given six-month extensions; university to reconsider publishing model
13 January 2020
Staff at the University of Western Australia Publishing (UWAP) have been given six-month extensions of their contracts, amid the university’s plans to reconsider the publishing model of the press. The...
Hardie Grant announces new parental leave policy
11 December 2019
Hardie Grant will introduce changes to its parental leave policy in 2020 that will mean secondary carers will receive the same paid parental leave benefits as primary carers—13 weeks of...
Sun wins KYD New Critic Award
11 December 2019
Sydney-based writer and designer Michael Sun has been named the winner of the 2020 Kill Your Darlings (KYD) New Critic Award. Sun receives a $1000 cash prize, plus a regular...
Inaugural Writing WA Literary Lions Medal shortlist announced
11 December 2019
Writing WA has announced the shortlist for the inaugural Literary Lions Medal. The new award recognises individuals who have made a substantial contribution to the vitality and success of Western...
Peri Wilson appointed A&U publicity director
11 December 2019
Peri Wilson has been appointed publicity director at Allen & Unwin (A&U). Wilson has worked across media, arts and advertising industries, within companies including Random House, Yahoo7, Sensis, PwC and...
Lebeter wins Horne Prize 2019 for essay on climate change and biodiversity
11 December 2019
Rachael Lebeter has won the the $15,000 Horne Prize for her essay ‘Diary of a Wildlife Carer’, on the plight of native fauna in the face of climate change and...
HQ Fiction acquires Fiona Lowe novels in two-book deal
11 December 2019
HarperCollins imprint HQ Fiction has acquired ANZ rights to two new novels by Victoria-based author Fiona Lowe in a 'substantial' deal. A Home Like Ours, the first novel in the...
Copyright Agency announces recipients of $455k in funding grants
10 December 2019
Twenty-one projects and six new initiatives have received a total of $455,691 in the latest round of funding from the Copyright Agency’s Cultural Fund. Literary organisations and projects that received...
