WBN feature | Books+Publishing

A year of Australian audiobooks: 2025 preview

Wednesday, 11 December 2024
Audiobook lovers have plenty of local content due in 2025. Here, we round up the Australian titles highlighted by local audio publishers Bolinda and Wavesound. All our 2025 Books+Publishing preview feature articles...

New year 2025 preview: CYA

Wednesday, 11 December 2024
From the witchy to the wistful, from the fact-filled to the fantastical, publishers have pulled together their lists of highlighted children's and young adult titles for 2025. Read on to...

New year 2025 preview: Poetry

Wednesday, 11 December 2024
Publishers highlight forthcoming poetry books from well-loved voices in the field—like Kirli Saunders, Omar Sakr, Grace Yee, Antigone Kefala and Eileen Chong—as well as titles from some poets newer to...

Kate Kemp on ‘The Grapevine’

Tuesday, 10 December 2024
Kate Kemp’s debut, The Grapevine (Hachette, February 2025), unravels the mystery of a murder in 1970s Canberra, revealing hidden secrets and buried tensions within the close-knit community of Warrah Place....

New year 2025 preview: Nonfiction

Wednesday, 4 December 2024
As we head towards 2025, publishers are preparing to send a wide array of new nonfiction titles out onto our bookshelves. Among the titles publishers are keen to highlight, booksellers...

‘I do, in fact, belong here’: Looking back and forward with the 2024 Open Book interns

Wednesday, 4 December 2024
First run as a pilot program offering two internships in 2022, the Open Book paid internship program is a joint sector initiative that aims to foster cultural and linguistic diversity...

‘There is nothing else quite like it’: Terri-ann White on Sharjah

Wednesday, 4 December 2024
Publishers and literary agents from 108 countries participated in this year’s Sharjah Publishers Conference, and Upswell publisher Terri-ann White was an Australian representative to the conference. She writes on the...

New year 2025 preview: Fiction

Wednesday, 27 November 2024
Unpublished manuscript prizes, hotly contest auctions, agents, slush piles, or authors wooed from rival publishing houses—wherever they came from, these are the fiction titles publishers are excited about for 2025....

Amplify Bookstore’s summer reading recommendations

Wednesday, 20 November 2024
Amplify Bookstore is an independent online bookseller specialising in books by Black, Indigenous and People of Colour (BIPOC) authors, founded by Jing Xuan Teo and Marina Sano. Here, they share...

Karina May on ‘That Island Feeling’

Tuesday, 19 November 2024
Karina May is an avid romance reader and journalist turned author of ‘lively love stories for wanderlusters’, including Never Ever Forever and Duck à l’Orange for Breakfast. Her fourth novel, That...

Sophie Clark on ‘Cruel Is the Light’

Tuesday, 12 November 2024
Tasmanian-based author Sophie Clark went from working for the Australian Senate to being a member of the Pitch Wars class of 2021. Her debut novel, Cruel Is the Light (Penguin,...

Melissa Garside on ‘Lexie Moon and the Word Burgling Bungle’

Tuesday, 5 November 2024
Melissa Garside, a primary school teacher and author with a passion for language, showcases her love for words and science in a story about a 10-year-old inventor in her debut...

Ali Gripper on ‘Saltwater Cure’

Tuesday, 29 October 2024
Sydney-based, award-winning journalist Ali Gripper has contributed features to some of Australia's leading newspapers and magazines. Her first biography, The Barefoot Surgeon (A&U, 2018), told the story of Nepalese eye...

Teens and the ‘book slump’: Why we should diagnose a situation rather than an identity

Wednesday, 23 October 2024
With multiple reports pointing to a decline in reading for pleasure among young people, school library and research professional Gabrielle Mace argues a change in language could help teens avoid...

Jackie French on ‘Tigg and the Bandicoot Bushranger’

Tuesday, 15 October 2024
With a career spanning about 30 years and over 140 books for children and adults, Jackie French loves to incorporate Australian history and nature into her work. Her latest novel,...

Sally Rippin on children’s literature, literacy and gatekeeping

Wednesday, 9 October 2024
Sally Rippin is the Australian Children’s Laureate for 2024–25, the latest step in a career that has also included writing over 100 books for children and young adults, including the series...

Sophie Beer on ‘Thunderhead’

Tuesday, 1 October 2024
Prolific illustrator Sophie Beer’s debut middle-grade novel, Thunderhead (November, A&U Children’s), was inspired by her own experience with a brain tumour that resulted in hearing loss. Books+Publishing reviewer Clare Millar...

Inga Simpson on ‘The Thinning’

Tuesday, 24 September 2024
Novelist and nature writer Inga Simpson's sixth novel, The Thinning (November 2024, Hachette), imagines a potential future through an astronomical lens. Books+Publishing reviewer Ana Brawls describes the book as 'an...

Shannon Martinez on ‘Vegan Italian Food’

Tuesday, 17 September 2024
Chef and restaurateur Shannon Martinez is a pioneer in her industry, bringing vegan cooking to the masses through her books and restaurants, including Smith + Daughters. Her latest cookbook, Vegan...

Michelle de Kretser on ‘Theory & Practice’

Tuesday, 10 September 2024
Two-time Miles Franklin winner Michelle de Kretser’s latest novel, Theory & Practice (November 2024, Text), is a combination of fiction, memoir and essay set in St Kilda, Melbourne, in 1986....

‘A service we wish to recommit to and double down on’: Shant Kradjian on Booktopia’s distribution services, staffing, and plans to rebuild trust

Tuesday, 3 September 2024
Shant Kradjian, owner of digiDirect, is the new owner of Booktopia, which began trading again last week. With plans ‘to restore Booktopia with a back-to-basics strategy’, Kradjian says his team...

Alyson O’Brien on literacy and trade publishing: ‘It’s lucky for a manuscript for the very young to even make it to an acquisitions meeting’

Wednesday, 28 August 2024
A year ago, when former Bright Light publisher Alyson O'Brien moved from commercial publishing to Raising Literacy Australia, she thought her commercial experience would add value to the organisation; she...

David Dyer on ‘This Kingdom of Dust’

Tuesday, 27 August 2024
David Dyer’s debut novel, The Midnight Watch (Penguin, 2016), focused on the ship that witnessed the Titanic’s distress rockets but failed to respond. His sophomore novel, This Kingdom of Dust...

Returning to BookUp in 2024

Wednesday, 21 August 2024
The annual BookUp conference for 2024, presented by the Australian Publishers Association (APA), was held at the State Library Victoria, Melbourne, on Wednesday 7 August, with wide-ranging sessions inviting participants to contemplate...

Yin on ‘The Conscious Style Guide’

Wednesday, 14 August 2024
Karen Yin is an award-winning writer and editor. She created the Conscious Style Guide, a resource website for writers, editors and others interested in conscious language, as well as the...

Rochelle Siemienowicz on ‘Double Happiness’

Tuesday, 13 August 2024
Rochelle Siemienowicz is a Melbourne-based author, journalist and film critic. Her debut fiction novel, Double Happiness (MidnightSun, October 2024), ‘explores the intricacies, challenges and taboos surrounding polyamory and ethical non-monogamy’, according...

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