Heifetz, Gilliatt, McGuire, Slater form a4 Literary; Booktopia administrators call second creditor meeting; Walkley Book Award shortlist announced
Grace Heifetz, Tom Gilliatt, Michaela McGuire and Rebecca Slater have announced the creation of new literary agency a4 Literary. This follows news of the upcoming dissolution of Left Bank Literary, which was made up of sole traders Heifetz, Gilliatt and Gaby Naher; Naher plans to relaunch her former operation The Naher Agency.
McGrathNicol, the company acting as administrators for Booktopia Group Limited, has issued notice of a second meeting of creditors, which will occur early next week, and has made its report to creditors available on its website.
Meanwhile, the Australian Library and Information Association has selected The Truck Cat (HGCP), written by Deborah Frenkel and illustrated by Danny Snell, for the 2025 National Simultaneous Storytime event; Creative Australia has announced a new round of recipients of its Elevate: First Nations Storytelling and Literature career development funding; the State Library of NSW has announced the recipients of its 2024 research fellowships; and Writers Victoria has announced the recipients for the 12th round of the Neilma Sidney Literary Travel Fund.
In awards news, the Walkley Foundation has announced the Walkley Book Awards shortlist; shortlists have also been announced for the Voss Literary Prize and the Australian Political Book of the Year Award; and the winners of the 2024 Speech Pathology Australia Book of the Year Awards have been announced.
Overseas, Kathleen DuVal won the 2024 Cundill History Prize for Native Nations: A Millennium in North America (Random House US); and in other international news, Publishers Weekly reported that the US-based reading subscription platform Scribd—which offers formats including magazines, ebooks and audiobooks through its Everand reading platform and announced its Australian launch in 2021—is moving away from its unlimited subscription model, while in the Netherlands, the country’s largest book publisher—Veen Bosch & Keuning (VBK), which was acquired by Simon & Schuster earlier this year—has confirmed it plans to use artificial intelligence to translate some of its books into English, according to the Bookseller.
In acquisitions news, Penguin Random House this week announced the acquisition of ANZ rights to three books from YA author Lynette Noni: Allen & Unwin acquired world rights to Lights, Camera, Love by Natalie Murray and ANZ rights to debut thriller Stillwater by Tanya Scott (the latter in a two-book deal); and HarperCollins acquired ANZ rights to three new books by Dervla McTiernan.
Category: This week’s news
