Sophie Higgins joins ILF board
Wednesday, 24 June 2026
The Indigenous Literacy Foundation (ILF) has announced the appointment of Sophie Higgins to its board of directors. Recently promoted to head of sales and operations at Booktopia, Higgins has worked...
Miles Franklin Literary Award 2026 shortlist announced
Wednesday, 24 June 2026
The shortlist for the 2026 Miles Franklin Literary Award has been announced. Chosen from a longlist of 10, the shortlisted titles are: Discipline (Randa Abdel-Fattah, University of Queensland Press) First...
Anna Battese recommends
Tuesday, 23 June 2026
There are so many incredible Australian kids’ books out there, which makes this question so hard to answer! I'm going to be a terrible cheat and give you my just-read...
Anna Battese on “The Grey Beret’s Guide to Surviving the Odds”
Tuesday, 23 June 2026
Anna Battese is a Melbourne-based children’s author whose debut middle-grade novel The Grey Beret’s Guide to Surviving the Odds (Simon & Schuster Australia, August) is the first in a planned...
QWC Varuna 2026 fellowships announced
Tuesday, 23 June 2026
Varuna has announced the 2026 recipients and shortlisted writers for the Queensland Writers Centre (QWC) fellowships. The recipient of the 2026 QWC Established Writers Fellowship is Ashley Hay, author and Meanjin...
McGraw Hill sales flat, income up
Tuesday, 23 June 2026
US educational publisher McGraw Hill, which operates a subsidiary in Australia among more than 100 countries outside of the US, has released its first full year of financial results since...
PANZ Publishing Market Size Report shows revenue up in 2025
Tuesday, 23 June 2026
Publishing revenue in Aotearoa New Zealand increased by 1.8% to NZ$287.4 million in 2025, while total unit sales grew by 2.4% to 18.6 million books, according to the New Zealand...
Ozlit festival to celebrate Australian writing in London
Tuesday, 23 June 2026
A new festival celebrating Australian literature will be held in London in October, reports the Bookseller. The OzLit festival will be produced on behalf of the Foundation for Australian and...
Summit Books acquires Jonathan Biggins’s “Ocean’s 55+”
Tuesday, 23 June 2026
Simon & Schuster imprint Summit Books Australia has acquired world rights to Ocean’s 55+, a cosy crime novel by actor, writer and comedian Jonathan Biggins. Described by the publisher as...
QBD opens Mirrabooka store
Tuesday, 23 June 2026
QBD has opened a new store in the Perth suburb of Mirrabooka, Western Australia. The store, which opened on Saturday 20 June, is located in Square Mirrabooka. With the addition...
Writers Victoria plans GoFundMe, philanthropy strategy after petition tabled
Monday, 22 June 2026
A petition to restore funding for Writers Victoria has been tabled in the Victorian parliament, with Minister for Creative Industries Vicki Ward required to provide a written response. Writers Victoria chair...
Hachette launches educators’ hub
Monday, 22 June 2026
Hachette Australia has announced the launch of the Hachette Australia Educators’ Hub, intended as an online resource to help Australian teachers and librarians discover, access and download educational resources from...
New Voices of Aotearoa 2026 announced
Monday, 22 June 2026
The 8 authors selected as the 2026 New Voices of Aotearoa (NVA) have been announced. The authors, selected by a judging panel and administered by the Coalition for Books, are:...
Granta terminates relationship with Commonwealth Foundation, ends publishing partnerships after AI controversy
Monday, 22 June 2026
In the UK, literary magazine Granta has terminated its relationship with the Commonwealth Foundation, which runs the Commonwealth Short Story Prize, and will “no longer engage in external publishing partnerships”....
Jenny Lu wins inaugural translation prize
Monday, 22 June 2026
Brisbane-based translator Jenny Lu has won the inaugural Voices of Today Literary Translation Prize, worth £1,500. Created and administered by the UK‑ and China‑based cultural communications agency Singing Grass, the...
Marten Bequest 2026 recipients announced
Monday, 22 June 2026
Poets Eunice Andrada and Sanja Grozdanic are among the 7 recipients of the 2026 Marten Bequest Travelling Scholarships, each worth $50,000. The scholarships, administered by Creative Australia, enable artists “to...
Holden Sheppard’s “Yeah the Boys” to be adapted for TV
Monday, 22 June 2026
Deadset Pictures has acquired the screen rights to Holden Sheppard’s novel Yeah the Boys in a deal brokered by Gaby Naher at the Naher Agency. The novel is a sequel to...
Upswell Publishing acquires Meera Atkinson poetry collection
Monday, 22 June 2026
Upswell Publishing has acquired world rights to the poetry collection Some Letters Take a Lifetime by Sydney-based writer Meera Atkinson. Meera Atkinson is the author of Map of Skin (Pink...
Melbourne Books acquires Takako Tamura’s “Sauces: Eats and Beats”
Monday, 22 June 2026
Melbourne Books has acquired world rights to Sauces: Eats and Beats by Takako Tamura. The “combination of cookbook and culture” draws on Tamura’s Japanese heritage and shares the recipes for...
Hardie Grant acquires Midnight Oil drummer Rob Hirst’s “World Is Almost at Peace” under Pantera imprint
Monday, 22 June 2026
Hardie Grant Books imprint Pantera Press has acquired world rights to World Is Almost at Peace: A Lifetime of Songwriting for Midnight Oil and More, the final book by the...
Black Inc. acquires Mark McKenna biography “Bob Brown: A Life”
Monday, 22 June 2026
Black Inc. has acquired world rights to Bob Brown: A Life, a biography of the Greens founder, politician and activist by Mark McKenna, via Lyn Tranter at Australian Literary Management....
Waterstones Debut Fiction Prize 2026 shortlist announced
Thursday, 18 June 2026
In the UK, the shortlist for the Waterstones Debut Fiction Prize, worth £5000, has been announced, reports the Bookseller. The 6 titles shortlisted for the 2026 award are: Honey in the...
ABA launches Writing Australia–funded bookseller grants
Thursday, 18 June 2026
With funding from Writing Australia, the Australian Booksellers Association (ABA) will offer grants of $2,000 to $10,000 through its new ABA Bookseller Events Program. The first round of grants are...
ASA updates contract templates with AI clauses
Thursday, 18 June 2026
The Australian Society of Authors (ASA) has updated its model publishing agreement templates for authors and illustrators with new AI clauses. In the updated model trade publishing agreement documents, key...
Wilderness Society announces 2026 Karajia, environment award shortlists
Thursday, 18 June 2026
The Wilderness Society has announced the shortlists for the 2026 Environment Award for Children’s Literature and Karajia Award for Children’s Literature. The shortlisted titles in each category are: Environment Award...
HarperCollins acquires Hayden Green’s YA verse novel in two-book deal
Thursday, 18 June 2026
HarperCollins Children’s Books has acquired world rights to YA verse novel Not Black Enough by Hayden Green in a two-book deal negotiated by Sarah McKenzie of Sarah McKenzie Literary Management...
Wombat Books acquires Linsey Painter’s “The Butterfly Mermaid”
Thursday, 18 June 2026
Rhiza Press imprint Wombat Books has acquired world rights to The Butterfly Mermaid, a middle-grade book by Linsey Painter. The Butterfly Mermaid is a “fun, portal fantasy adventure perfect for...
New bookshops in Victoria, Queensland and online
Thursday, 18 June 2026
Three recent bookstores have launched with a focus on building and serving communities, both local and special-interest. Under the Elms Bookshop opened in the Victorian town of Camperdown in early...
Telling everybody
Wednesday, 17 June 2026
NielsenIQ reported sales for the year to date are up, among other news from the 2026 Australian Booksellers Association annual conference, which wrapped up on Monday afternoon; Byron Writers Festival...
NielsenIQ: Local sales up $14 million for the year to date
Wednesday, 17 June 2026
Book sales in the local market are up so far in 2026, representing $14 million more in sales for the first quarter of 2026 compared with 2025, with adult fiction...
