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WBN advance reviews >

Good Intentions (Jessy Wu, Macmillan) 

Tuesday, 5 May 2026
Personal and professional integrity face off in Jessy Wu’s highly engaging debut, Good Intentions – a fast-paced millennial romance set in the worlds of investigative journalism and futures trading. Nadia...

One Word (Melissa-Jane Fogarty, Lothian) 

Tuesday, 5 May 2026
Melissa-Jane Fogarty’s One Word is a gentle yet powerful First Nations story about a young girl, Myra, who loves to stay with Pop. When she overhears him speaking to his...

Without a Trace (Susannah Glenn, Pantera) 

Tuesday, 5 May 2026
Susannah Glenn’s second novel, Without a Trace, follows Charlotte Clarke, a once confident pilot and the daughter of a scenic flight company owner. While Charlotte is grieving the loss of...

Worry Doll (Laura McPhee-Browne, Scribe) 

Tuesday, 5 May 2026
Worry Doll is the immersive and introspective third novel by Laura McPhee-Browne (Cherry Beach, Little Plum). It follows 2 women: Heloise, a 36-year-old Melburnian living with her partner, a man,...

LIT (Anna Woods, Echo) 

Tuesday, 28 April 2026
Auckland-based writer Anna Woods’ debut novel, LIT, is a psychological thriller set in the same city, centring on 3 emotionally and professionally entangled architects: Virginia Ishak (Gin), Clarissa Taylor (Clary)...

The Secret Garden Club (Wendy Lynn Newton, Macmillan) 

Tuesday, 28 April 2026
Whimsical, witty and genuinely heartwarming, Wendy Lynn Newton’s The Secret Garden Club is a striking debut. When 52-year-old lapsed artist Hilary finds her husband of 30 years, newly retired engineer...

Night Swimming (Sharon Kernot, Text) 

Night Swimming book cover Tuesday, 21 April 2026
Sharon Kernot’s first foray into adult fiction, Night Swimming, is both a suspenseful verse novel and a ghost story in which the narrator of the book haunts herself. Night Swimming...

A Flash in the Dust (Meg Caddy, UQP) 

A Flash in the Dust cover Tuesday, 21 April 2026
Set in Western Australia in 1899, Meg Caddy’s queer YA historical novel A Flash in the Dust follows Gilberta and Norah, who are imprisoned in Fremantle Asylum and escape into...

I Remember Everything (Fiona Wilkes, Fremantle) 

The cover of "I Remember Everything" by Fiona Wilkes. Tuesday, 21 April 2026
Fiona Wilkes’s debut novel, I Remember Everything, memorialises the LGBTQIA+ communities lost to the AIDS crisis. In this fictionalised memoir, Billie recounts her formative years from 1979 to 1990, moving...

The Sisters of Serendib (Ayesha Inoon, HQ Fiction) 

Tuesday, 21 April 2026
The Sisters of Serendib, the sophomore novel from Ayesha Inoon (Untethered), opens in 1990 with a flurry of events as Tamil Muslims board boats to escape the escalating violence of...

Wormhole (Hannah McElhinney, Affirm) 

Tuesday, 21 April 2026
How far should you go in search of answers when mainstream medicine can’t help? Wormhole is author Hannah McElhinney’s attempt to answer that question through a blend of memoir, cultural...

Touch Grass (Mary Colussi, Penguin) 

Tuesday, 14 April 2026
Mary Colussi’s debut novel, Touch Grass, is the sharp and inventive winner of the 2025 Penguin Literary Prize. This work of speculative fiction takes readers into the not-too-distant future, where strawberries are...

Detention (Ralph Jackman, A&U) 

Tuesday, 14 April 2026
Detention is a powerful memoir about Australia’s youth detention system, told from the perspective of a rookie teacher and his fight for the rights of some of our country's most...

Over to You (Georgie Tunny, A&U) 

Tuesday, 7 April 2026
In her emotionally turbulent debut, Over to You, Georgie Tunny captures the highs and lows of working in television news. The novel follows 3 friends – Carter, Naya and Greta...

Deprivation (Roy V Marshan, New Dawn) 

Tuesday, 7 April 2026
In Deprivation, Roy V Marshan explores cannibalism as a feature of late-stage capitalism. In the 1973 film Soylent Green, cannibalism is presented as the solution to overpopulation, while in Agustina...