Inside the Australian and New Zealand book industry

Image. Advertisement:

WBN advance reviews >

Waiting for the Storks (Katrina Nannestad, ABC Books) 

Tuesday, 6 September 2022
Waiting for the Storks is the latest historical fiction title from Katrina Nannestad, transporting the reader to the Second World War and the time of Himmler’s Lebensborn Program, in which...

Tell Me Again (Amy Thunig, UQP) 

Tuesday, 6 September 2022
Amy Thunig is an academic and social commentator on shows such as ABC’s The Drum. She also grew up in poverty, the child of parents battling drug addictions who provided...

Bold Types (Patricia Clarke, NLA Publishing) 

Tuesday, 30 August 2022
Patricia Clarke started her career in journalism in 1951, a time when the industry was very much a man's world but women were making inroads. In Bold Types, Clarke gives...

A Brief Affair (Alex Miller, A&U) 

Tuesday, 30 August 2022
A Brief Affair is contemporary fiction by multi–award winning author Alex Miller. The novel follows a moment in the life of Frances Egan, a woman who lives in regional Victoria...

Salonika Burning (Gail Jones, Text) 

Tuesday, 23 August 2022
Award-winning novelist Gail Jones’s new offering adapts the First World War experiences of four very real people: British artists Grace Pailthorpe and Stanley Spencer, and Australians Olive King and Stella...

Men I Trust (Tommi Parrish, Scribe) 

Tuesday, 23 August 2022
Scribe is proving itself to be at the forefront of local comics publishing with its second graphic release of 2022, Men I Trust by US-based Australian artist Tommi Parrish. The...

Koori Princess (Anita Heiss, Magabala) 

Tuesday, 23 August 2022
Anita Heiss is an award-winning author who has published across the gamut of Australian writing: from adult fiction and memoir to children’s novels, she’s seemingly done it all. Koori Princess...

A Tiny Light (Alison Lester, UQP) 

Tuesday, 23 August 2022
It’s always a delight when Alison Lester, one of Australia’s most well loved picture-book creators, releases a new story. A Tiny Light is her latest offering, a charming narrative in...

Willowman (Inga Simpson, Hachette)

Tuesday, 23 August 2022
In Inga Simpson’s heartfelt new novel Willowman, a gifted young cricketer and a dedicated batmaker live their lives in parallel to one another, their love of the game binding them...

Berani (Michelle Kadarusman, A&U) 

Saturday, 20 August 2022
Berani is a powerful middle-grade story about animal activism set in Indonesia, by the Indonesian-Australian author of Music for Tigers. Weaving in two interconnected stories and three voices, including that...

The Soulmate (Sally Hepworth, Macmillan)

Tuesday, 16 August 2022
Sally Hepworth delivers another brilliant, page-turning domestic thriller with her eighth novel The Soulmate. Set in the idyllic coastal town of Portsea, sheltered from the hustle of city life, the...

Boundary Crossers (Meg Foster, NewSouth) 

Tuesday, 9 August 2022
In her new book Boundary Crossers, historian Meg Foster combs archives and family histories to explore questions surrounding the lesser known bushrangers of Australian history. Is there more to the story...

Amazing Animal Journeys (Jennifer Cossins, Lothian) 

Tuesday, 9 August 2022
Tasmanian artist Jennifer Cossins hit world picture-book fame with 101 Collective Nouns, and has since collected a swag of CBCA and other accolades. Her newest title, the nonfiction Amazing Animal...

The Lovers (Yumna Kassab, Ultimo) 

Tuesday, 9 August 2022
Yumna Kassab’s The Lovers is the folkloric tale of Jamila and Amir’s love. We don’t know many details of their relationship or what their love was like at its crescendo;...

The Careless State (Mark Considine, MUP) 

Tuesday, 2 August 2022
The Careless State is a timely and forensic examination of the failures of the Australian government’s provision of social services. The Covid-19 pandemic has exposed—particularly through the publicised failures in...

Off to the Market (Alice Oehr, Scribble) 

Tuesday, 2 August 2022
Off to the Market is a celebration of markets and healthy, whole foods. Graphic artist Alice Oehr showcases her skills in her debut narrative nonfiction picture book, for children aged...

Her Death Was Also Water (Allen C Jones, MidnightSun) 

Tuesday, 2 August 2022
Seven people, an open boat, a flood. I’m not sure if they’re supposed to be archetypes, but they’re uncomfortably familiar. The men: a widowed South-Asian mini-mart owner, a pathetic liberal...

Dusty in the Outwilds (Rhiannon Williams, HGCP) 

Tuesday, 2 August 2022
Dusty, real name Willa Dust, might just be the most intuitive, smart and brave 12-year-old you’ll ever get caught up in an extraordinary adventure with. Dusty has always heard about...

Bohemian Negligence (Bertie Blackman, A&U) 

Tuesday, 2 August 2022
Bertie Blackman is an artist and ARIA Award–winning musician whose storytelling is as beautiful as the drawings scattered throughout her memoir. Bohemian Negligence is told by Blackman as a four-year-old...

The Tower (Carol Lefevre, Spinifex Press) 

Tuesday, 26 July 2022
The Tower follows Carol Lefevre’s well-received 2021 Christina Stead Prize–shortlisted novella Murmurations. Set in Australia and England, The Tower is exquisitely sophisticated in imagery and form. It is structured around...