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Reviews

 

Adult fiction

Safe Haven (Shankari Chandran, Ultimo)
To Sing of War (Catherine McKinnon, HarperCollins)
Saltblood (Francesca de Tores, Bloomsbury)
The Mistress of Dara Island (Averil Kenny, Echo)
The Deed (Susannah Begbie, Hachette)
Thunderhead (Miranda Darling, Scribe)
The Work (Bri Lee, A&U)
Sanctuary (Garry Disher, Text)
The Glass House (Anne Buist & Graeme Simsion, Hachette)
It Takes a Town (Aoife Clifford, Ultimo)

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Safe Haven (Shankari Chandran, Ultimo)

Released May 2024

Miles Franklin–winning author Shankari Chandran turns her focus to Australia’s inhumane practice of mandatory detention in her fourth novel, Safe Haven. As in Chai Time at Cinnamon Gardens, a focal part of the unfolding story is Sri Lanka’s brutal civil war that left hundreds of thousands displaced and dead. Tamil asylum seeker Fina survives a… Read more

To Sing of War (Catherine McKinnon, HarperCollins)

Released May 2024

From Miles Franklin–shortlisted author Catherine McKinnon (Storyland), To Sing of War confronts the interconnectedness that binds humanity. Against the backdrop of WWII, we find ourselves immersed in the jungles of New Guinea, where a young Australian nurse, Lotte Wyld, encounters her first love, Virgil. Simultaneously, in Los Alamos, New Mexico, young physicists Miriam Carver and… Read more
 

Adult nonfiction

How to Avoid a Happy Life (Julia Lawrinson, Fremantle)
Peripathetic: Notes on (un)belonging (Cher Tan, NewSouth)
Ela! Ela! (Ella Mittas, Murdoch)
Human? (Ziggy Ramo, Pantera)
Work Backwards (Tim Duggan, Pantera)
Deep Water (James Bradley, Hamish Hamilton)
Italian Coastal (Amber Guinness, T&H)
Girt by Sea: Re-imagining Australia’s security (Rebecca Strating & Joanne Wallis, La Trobe)
Alice™: The biggest untold story in the history of money (Stuart Kells, MUP)
How to Knit a Human (Anna Jacobson, NewSouth)

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How to Avoid a Happy Life (Julia Lawrinson, Fremantle)

Released May 2024

How to Avoid a Happy Life is a lively memoir by Julia Lawrinson (Losing It), the author of over 15 books for young people. This memoir takes readers through a lifetime of sad and unusual experiences that inspired Lawrinson's books, such as Bye, Beautiful and Skating the Edge. She details her childhood and school years, time spent in mental health inpatient services, travels, young… Read more

Peripathetic: Notes on (un)belonging (Cher Tan, NewSouth)

Released May 2024

The nine essays in this collection, Peripathetic by Melbourne-based Cher Tan, use the form’s digressive capacity well. In elastic prose informed by wide reading, Tan heads down wordy, winding rabbit holes, exploring such issues as the ubiquity of English in the internet age, the wonders and perils of identity creation, or how Shanzhai might just… Read more
 

Children's picture books

What Stars Are For (Margeaux Davis, Affirm)
The Land Recalls You (Kirli Saunders, illus David Cragg & Noni Cragg, Scholastic)
Our Flag, Our Story (Bernard Namok Jnr & Thomas Mayo, illus Tori-Jay Mordey, Magabala)
Country (Aunty Fay Muir & Sue Lawson, illus Cheryl Davison, Wild Dog)
How to Measure the Ocean (Inda Ahmad Zahri, A&U Children’s)
Tree (Claire Saxby, illus Jess Racklyeft, A&U Children’s)
Happy All Over (Emma Quay, ABC Books)
Pidge’s Poppies (Jan Andrews, illus Timothy Ide, Ford St)
Seed to Sky: Life in the Daintree (Pamela Freeman, illus Liz Anelli, Walker)
Mitchell Itches (Kristin Kelly, illus Amelina Jones, EK Books)

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What Stars Are For (Margeaux Davis, Affirm)

Released May 2024

What Stars Are For is the first picture book by sewing pattern and soft toy designer Margeaux Davis. The emerging children’s book illustrator’s love for the natural world is informed by her background in environmental education, working as a National Parks ranger. Fans of Down the Road, Little Bee by Sarah Jane Lightfoot will enjoy… Read more

The Land Recalls You (Kirli Saunders, illus David Cragg & Noni Cragg, Scholastic)

Released May 2024

The title of multi-awarded Gunai poet Kirli Saunders’s picture book The Land Recalls You honours the Stolen Generations and their descendants, as well as others who have been taken from Country, in a story of remembering and returning. The book, illustrated by Bundjalung siblings David and Noni Cragg, begins: ‘Do not cry for earth who birthed you, for river as she calls… Read more
 

Younger readers

Cora Seen and Heard (Zanni Louise, Walker)
The Apprentice Witnesser (Bren MacDibble, A&U Children’s)
Wurrtoo (Tylissa Elisara, illus Dylan Finney, Lothian)
Jerry’s Window (Y K Willemse, Wombat Books)
Frog Squad: Dessert Disaster (Kate Temple & Jol Temple, illus Shiloh Gordon, HarperCollins)
The Pinchers and the Diamond Heist (Anders Sparring, illus Per Gustavsson, Gecko Press)
The Cave (Victor Kelleher, Eagle Books)
Roarsome (Joel Slack-Smith, illus Rebel Challenger, Scholastic)
Shower Land 1: Break the Curse (Nat Amoore, illus James Hart, Puffin)
Outlaw Girls (Emily Gale & Nova Weetman, Text)

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Cora Seen and Heard (Zanni Louise, Walker)

Released May 2024

When Cora’s family moves to Tasmania to renovate a decrepit theatre, Cora, 12, is thrilled at the opportunity to reinvent herself as Cora 2.0: more confident, admired, and interesting. But her insecurities have accompanied her interstate, along with some brewing tension between her parents, and her new life feels just as hard as her old… Read more

The Apprentice Witnesser (Bren MacDibble, A&U Children’s)

Released May 2024

Bren MacDibble has become well-known for her unique and heartfelt adventure novels for middle-grade readers, including How to Bee, The Dog Runner and Across the Risen Sea, as well as The Raven’s Song, her CBCA Award Honour Book co-written with Zana Fraillon. MacDibble’s latest solo creation, The Apprentice Witnesser, is no exception to this lineup of high-quality children’s… Read more
 

Young adult

The Unexpected Mess of It All (Gabrielle Tozer, HarperCollins)
Those Girls (Pamela Rushby, Walker)
Deep Is the Fen (Lili Wilkinson, A&U Children’s)
Signal Erased (Adele Jones, Rhiza Edge)
Gus and the Missing Boy (Troy Hunter, Wakefield)
Look Me in the Eye (Jane Godwin, Lothian)
I Hope This Doesn’t Find You (Ann Liang, Penguin)
What They Told Me (Hayley Lawrence, Scholastic)
Smoke & Mirrors (Barry Jonsberg, A&U Children’s)
Birdy (Sharon Kernot, Text)

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The Unexpected Mess of It All (Gabrielle Tozer, HarperCollins)

Released May 2024

Gold Inky award-winning author Gabrielle Tozer’s fifth YA novel, The Unexpected Mess of it All, displays her trademark empathy, humour and cheekiness. Jamila’s life is an unexpected mess. Since their house burned down, her family has been living in a caravan on the property of her ex-best friend, Billy Radcliffe. The only people who understand… Read more

Those Girls (Pamela Rushby, Walker)

Released April 2024

When Australia entered World War II, new possibilities emerged for women to enter the services, work in munitions or uniform factories, or join the Land Army to fill the workforce shortfalls. Pamela Rushby’s young adult novel Those Girls paints an indelible picture of the lives of some women in the Queensland Land Army, describing how exploitation, poor… Read more
 

Recently released titles

To and Fro (Anton Clifford-Motopi, A&U Children’s)
Some People Want to Shoot Me (Wayne Bergmann & Madelaine Dickie, Fremantle)
The Girl from Moscow (Julia Levitina, Pantera)
Like Fire-Hearted Suns (Melanie Joosten, Ultimo)
One Another (Gail Jones, Text)
The Most Amazing Thing (Ian Hayward Robinson, illus Matt Shanks, A&U Children’s)
What Happened to Nina? (Dervla McTiernan, HarperCollins)
The Rewilding (Donna M Cameron, Transit Lounge)
Shower Land 1: Break the Curse (Nat Amoore, illus James Hart, Puffin)
Shining Like the Sun (Stephen Orr, Wakefield)

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To and Fro (Anton Clifford-Motopi, A&U Children’s)

Released March 2024

To and Fro by debut author Anton Clifford-Motopi is a heartfelt and humorous exploration of the complexities of growing up mixed-race in Australia. This delightful offering for readers aged 8–12 tells an engaging story that seamlessly weaves in discussions of race and identity—a welcome addition to the Australian middle-grade landscape, which has a dearth of… Read more

Some People Want to Shoot Me (Wayne Bergmann & Madelaine Dickie, Fremantle)

Released March 2024

Some People Want to Shoot Me is the straight-talking biography of Wayne Bergmann, an Indigenous land rights advocate and native title lawyer who famously took on a multinational company and won. In the early 2010s, the Nyikina man led the fraught negotiations (on behalf of Traditional Owners) on the infamous James Price Point gas hub… Read more