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This Australian classic follows the lives of two Australian orphans, Caro and Grace Bell, who move to England in search of a better life. It’s a heartbreaking tale of unrequited passionate longing.Mi…
In the midst of the e-revolution, where we’re as likely to download as to leaf through a book, the idea of the book as an object of beauty is being lost. Or is it?To celebrate the launch of Rare…
In 2009, young Australian traveller Jock Palfreeman was found guilty of the murder of Andrei Monov. Monov was the son of a family well connected in the Sofia legal fraternity. Palfreeman claimed he w…
Studying a book or film can be a short-cut to consigning it to boredom. But our Texts in the City series – a gift to students, their teachers and lifelong learners – brings the VCE English and…
Born to a world without welcome, Isobel observes it warily – an alien trying to pass for a native. She’s more at ease with imaginary friends than the flesh-and-blood people she meets.Cate Kennedy…
Studying a book or film can be a short-cut to consigning it to boredom. But our Texts in the City series – a gift to students, their teachers and lifelong learners – brings the VCE English and…
Studying a book or film can be a short-cut to consigning it to boredom. But our Texts in the City series – a gift to students, their teachers and lifelong learners – brings the VCE English and…
Studying a book or film can be a short-cut to consigning it to boredom. But our Texts in the City series – a gift to students, their teachers and lifelong learners – brings the VCE English and…
Les Murray is undoubtedly one of Australia’s greatest living poets – and an international literary legend.The New Yorker has described him as ‘now routinely mentioned among the three or four leading …
Studying a book or film can be a short-cut to consigning it to boredom. But our Texts in the City series – a gift to students, their teachers and lifelong learners – brings the VCE English and…
In this very special event, two generations of Australian reportage royalty come together, as the world- renowned Helen Garner interviews Anna Krien, one of the brightest writers of her generation…
Our first ever event was a Debut Monday. Three years on, it’s still going strong, introducing new Australian talent each month.Whether it’s meeting Australia’s latest wunderkind or hearing an…
We can’t wait to get back on the road again – bringing some of our favourite writers to regional Victoria. We’ll be packing up the car with books and authors, travelling from country to coast … and m…
Studying a book or film can be a short-cut to consigning it to boredom. But our Texts in the City series – a gift to students, their teachers and lifelong learners – brings the VCE English and…
We’ve created an Australian Classics book club, just for you – with special writerly guests each month.Last year’s hugely popular Australian Literature 101 set the scene by introducing ten texts our …
Chris Somerville’s stories have appeared in literary journals including Voiceworks, The Lifted Brow, Paper Radio, Islet and Stilts. In 2003, he won the State Library of Queensland Young Writers…
Last Sunday, we held our annual Children’s Book Festival (in partnership with the State Library of Victoria). From 10am until 4pm, the State Library Lawns, our Performance Space, Little Lonsdale…
Studying a book or film can be a short-cut to consigning it to boredom. But our Texts in the City series – a gift to students, their teachers and lifelong learners – brings the VCE English and…
Studying a book or film can be a short-cut to consigning it to boredom. But our Texts in the City series – a gift to students, their teachers and lifelong learners – brings the VCE English and…
J.M. Coetzee is one of the world’s most prized literary treasures – and we’re lucky enough to have him living right here in Australia.The first author to win the Booker Prize twice, he won the Nobel …
Celebrated children’s book illustrator Freya Blackwood has a diverse creative background – extending from working on special effects for the Lord of the Rings films to her many collaborative books…
Bronwyn Bancroft is a Bundjalung woman, fashion designer and artist, whose credits include being one of the first Australian designers to be invited to show their work in Paris. Her career in…
Calling all kids!Have you ever been to a party where everybody there loves stories as much as you do? And all your favourite authors are there, talking about all your favourite characters? And you…
We’ve created an Australian Classics book club, just for you – with special writerly guests each month.Last year’s hugely popular Australian Literature 101 set the scene by introducing ten texts our …
Studying a book or film can be a short-cut to consigning it to boredom. But our Texts in the City series – a gift to students, their teachers and lifelong learners – brings the VCE English and…
Studying a book or film can be a short-cut to consigning it to boredom. But our Texts in the City series – a gift to students, their teachers and lifelong learners – brings the VCE English and…
Our first ever event was a Debut Monday. Three years on, it’s still going strong, introducing new Australian talent each month.Whether it’s meeting Australia’s latest wunderkind or hearing an…
Studying a book or film can be a short-cut to consigning it to boredom. But our Texts in the City series – a gift to students, their teachers and lifelong learners – brings the VCE English and…
Studying a book or film can be a short-cut to consigning it to boredom. But our Texts in the City series – a gift to students, their teachers and lifelong learners – brings the VCE English and…
Joyful Strains, as the title suggests, is a new anthology exploring the sometimes bittersweet experiences of new migrants to Australia. From the relief of being welcomed to a new homeland, to…
In this edition of our Texts in the City series, focussing on VCE English texts, join Tony Birch and Josephine Rowe explore the secrets and tensions in Raymond Carver’s 1976 short story collection…
Studying a book or film can be a short-cut to consigning it to boredom. But our Texts in the City series – a gift to students, their teachers and lifelong learners – brings the VCE English and…
Last year’s hugely popular Australian Literature 101 set the scene by introducing ten texts our experts deemed unmissable Australian reading. This year, we invite you on a brand new, leisurely…
Our first ever event was a Debut Monday. Three years on, it’s still going strong, introducing new Australian talent each month.Whether it’s meeting Australia’s latest wunderkind or hearing an…
We’ve created an Australian Classics book club, just for you – with special writerly guests each month.Last year’s hugely popular Australian Literature 101 set the scene by introducing ten texts our …
We bring you our favourite findings from around the internet this week.It’s … Groundhog Day! 20 years onGroundhog Dog is one of those quietly classic films – it’s not showily clever, it didn’t win…
Studying a book or film can be a short-cut to consigning it to boredom. But our Texts in the City series – a gift to students, their teachers and lifelong learners – brings the VCE English and…
Studying a book or film can be a short-cut to consigning it to boredom. But our Texts in the City series – a gift to students, their teachers and lifelong learners – brings the VCE English and…
We bring you our favourite findings from around the internet this week.Using the internet to market books in AustraliaCrikey’s Amber Jamieson has interviewed digital marketing staff at a number of…
When you travel, you don’t become a whole new person – you carry your interests with you. That’s why some people plunge themselves into daredevil adventure travel and others plan their trips around w…
We bring you our favourite findings from around the internet this week.Lizzie Bennett: Looking good at 200 years oldIt was the two-hundredth birthday of Pride and Prejudice this week – and the New…
By Andie FoxMiddle age can make you a more savvy audience for art … but also a lazier one, as it must be squeezed into an ever-more time-poor life. Andie Fox realises that she’s become so risk…
The digital revolution has hit the book business in a big way over the past couple of years, with the rise of e-books, e-readers and online bookshops.The Brotherhood of St Laurence was an early…
Damon Young is a philosopher, author and commentator. He is regularly published in the Age, the Australian, by the BBC and elsewhere. His first book, Distraction, has been published in the UK, the…
It’s a whole new year in publishing and reading – and if you’re already making up your ‘to read’ list, we can help. A plethora of publications have just published their lists of books to look out…
Yesterday, Wheeler Centre staff shared our favourite books of 2012. Today, some of the writers who’ve been part of the Wheeler Centre programme this year – whether as presenters, website…
Michael Williams DirectorMy top 13 are:Gone Girl – Gillian Flynn Behind the Beautiful Forevers – Katherine Boo The Australian…
We share five of our favourite links and articles from around the internet this week.Why your passwords don’t protect youWired senior writer Mat Horan was famously targeted by cyberhackers earlier…
By Sam CooneyThe publishing industry is a tough arena, and never more so than now. Sam Cooney looks at the weird, annoying and sometimes puzzling things publishers (and writers) do to promote their…
The first event ever to run at the Wheeler Centre was a Debut Mondays session, and two years on, we’re just as committed to fostering new talent.Whether it’s meeting Australian literature’s newest…
David Shields has been hailed as a writing revolutionary. His wildly inventive ‘manifesto’ Reality Hunger, a broadside against the contemporary novel, has been welcomed with open arms by novelists…
Ramona Koval has benignly ruled the literary airwaves for years, entering lounge rooms across the country as host of ABC Radio National’s The Book Show. Find out how books have made her who she is – …
By Tim Coronel Tim Coronel, former publisher of Bookseller and Publisher magazine, looks at the dramatic changes in ways of doing business over the past five years in the Australian book trade – and…
Five years ago, the tone of discussion about the book industry shifted from ‘confidence’ to ‘crisis’, as online shopping and the emergence of e-books shook up the established ways of doing business.I…
Geordie Williamson, one of our leading literary critics, approaches books and writing with the ardour of an enthusiast – though he’s also alarmed at the way classic Australian literature is falling o…
The first event ever to run at the Wheeler Centre was a Debut Mondays session, and two years on, we’re just as committed to fostering new talent.Whether it’s meeting Australian literature’s newest…
There was a suitably festive atmosphere at the Regent Ballroom for the Victorian Premier’s Literary Awards dinner last night, as writers swapped their standard work wear of tracksuit pants and…
Hilary Mantel has won the 2012 Man Booker Prize for Bring up the Bodies, making her the first woman – and the first British person – to win it twice. (The only other writers to win the prize twice…
Melinda Harvey is one of our current Wheeler Centre Hot Desk fellows, supported by the Readings Foundation. She’s working on a creative non-fiction essay called ‘Lip Service’ (part memoir, part…
Scriptwriting professor John Glavin told the Washington Post recently that turning a book into a film works best when the writer is willing to reinvent the book to suit the film medium, rather than a…
Christmas is here! Yes, we know it’s October … but in bookselling, October marks the beginning of the Christmas period, with publishers releasing their under-the-tree hopefuls onto the shelves. It’s …
We bring you our favourite links and articles we’ve found around the internet this week.Mad spoof of Apple mapsApple maps has to be the most embarrassing product launch in Apple history (and a…
The first event ever to run at the Wheeler Centre was a Debut Mondays session, and two years on, we’re just as committed to fostering new talent.Whether it’s meeting Australian literature’s newest…
Romney’s Responsibility MapRepublican presidential candidate Mitt Romney is negotiating a major campaign obstacle, after a secret video was released of his candid remarks to a donor gathering, who…
Looking for a literary rest-stop on today’s tour of the internet? Sit back and have a browse at these weird and wonderful libraries from around the world, from the Michaelangelo-designed Laurentian…
This week’s Friday High Five is a visual spectacular, as we bring you five fabulous sculptures, all made out of books. Enjoy!By Robert The.By Nick Georgiou.‘A wonderfully crafted and cleverly folded …
No matter how compelling a novel or a film might be, if you have to study it, there’s always the risk you’ll end up hating it. Not any more! A gift to VCE students, their teachers (and of course…
Join the Emerging Writers' Festival and editor Karen Pickering for the book launch of The Emerging Writer, an insider’s guide to navigating the writing world. This event will include the…
Join W.H. Chong for the first in an occasional series on the art and artistry of book design, be it traditional dust-jackets or futuristic visions of books of the future. Publisher’s brief: ‘Here…
Ford’s Theatre, the site of Abraham Lincoln’s 1865 assassination, is still operating. And they must be carrying around some serious guilt, because they’ve recently invested in a (literally) towering …
We don’t exactly judge a book by its cover here at the Wheeler Centre … but we do appreciate a good-looking book cover, nonetheless.The Australian Publishers' Association celebrates the best in…
In person, Jeanette Winterson has a somehow otherworldly appearance. Small and lithe, her short hair curling over her ears and at the nape of her neck, she resembles an elf or a pixie.Light-footed…
Literary young man Chad Harbach (a founding editor of Brooklyn lit-mag n+1) has hit a home-run with his first novel, The Art of Fielding. Ostensibly about an unlikely baseball star in a liberal arts …
We are delighted to be partnering with a sweep of wonderful festivals in Victoria’s regionsthis winter. What better excuse to get out into the countryside, than when you’re alsopromised fine…
We are delighted to be partnering with a sweep of wonderful festivals in Victoria’s regionsthis winter. What better excuse to get out into the countryside, than when you’re alsopromised fine…
We are delighted to be partnering with a sweep of wonderful festivals in Victoria’s regionsthis winter. What better excuse to get out into the countryside, than when you’re alsopromised fine…
Join us to celebrate the launch of the fabulous Emerging Writers' Festival program 2012. Three writers from a wide range of genres discuss the art of storytelling, and how they create compelling…
Blown CoversA terrific new coffee table book by the art director of the New Yorker, Françoise Mouly, collects her favourite covers that were either rejected (often for being too controversial) or…
Spain’s Librería General de Arte Martínez Pérez, open since 1890, is one of those bookshops that looks like it’s always been and always will be. So when Ailsa Piper received word of its closure, it…
In another Friday High Five themed edition, we share five bookish videos from around the web that made us giggle, including looks at the art of pencil sharpening and the smell of old books, a…
In our series of lectures and discussions on the classics of Australian literature, Ramona Koval and critic Kerryn Goldsworthy bring Helen Garner’s classic book (later a successful film), Monkey…
In this major new weekly series hosted by Ramona Koval, running in parallel with the university calendar, contemporary writers speak on seminal Australian texts, giving context, sharing their…
Wondering what to do with your old books? It can be hard to get much (or any) cash from your local second-hand bookshop these days. If you’re a dab hand with scissors and a glue-gun, you might like t…
The very first event to run at the Wheeler Centre was a Debut Mondays session – and two years on, we’re as committed as ever to fostering new talent.Whether it’s meeting Australian literature’s…
No matter how compelling a novel or a film might be, if you have to study it, there’s always the risk you’ll end up hating it. Not any more! A gift to VCE students, their teachers (and of course…
No matter how compelling a novel or a film might be, if you have to study it, there’s always the risk you’ll end up hating it. Not any more! A gift to VCE students, their teachers (and of course…
The big event on the calendar of all lovers of children’s literature is back! On Sunday 25 March, your favourite authors and illustrators will be taking over the lawns of the State Library for a day …
The big event on the calendar of all lovers of children’s literature is back! On Sunday 25 March, your favourite authors and illustrators will be taking over the lawns of the State Library for a day …
The big event on the calendar of all lovers of children’s literature is back! On Sunday 25 March, your favourite authors and illustrators will be taking over the lawns of the State Library for a day …
No matter how compelling a novel or a film might be, if you have to study it, there’s always the risk you’ll end up hating it. Not any more! A gift to VCE students, their teachers (and of course…
Who tells the story of a country? What story does a country’s national literature tell about its people and its identity? Is there such a thing as Australian literature at all? In the debut event of …
No matter how compelling a novel or a film might be, if you have to study it, there’s always the risk you’ll end up hating it. Not any more! A gift to VCE students, their teachers (and of course…
Few thinkers have succeeded in bringing the world of ideas beyond the ivory tower with such clarity and grace as Alain de Botton. In an event that extends one of the Wheeler Centre chief themes for t…
Book covers are such an important part of the process of matching readers to books. The old adage ‘don’t judge a book by its cover’ is balanced by another, equally telling one: ‘First impressions…
In a nice departure from the traditional Australia Day focus on flags and sporting heroes, The Sunday Age has marked the lead-up to the occasion with an editorial decrying our ‘tendency to…
Emerging Writers' Festival director and avid traveller Lisa Dempster reports on the growth of contemporary literary culture within and around the Sharjah International Book Fair, which in 2011…
Some time ago, we reported on a tiny phone booth library located in Somerset, England. We even pondered whether it may be the world’s smallest. But it seems the field is thicker with competition
When Captain Cat beseeched his deceased lover Rosie Probert to “let me shipwreck in your thighs” in Dylan Thomas' Under Milk Wood, we truly doubt he meant anything resembling the fate of the Costa…
While citizens took to the streets to protest around the world, there were other upheavals in 2011: not least in the world of publishing. As digital publishing consolidated its grip on the…
One of non-fiction’s most enduring ethical dilemmas is balancing the public interest against the interest of its subjects. The dilemma has come to the fore again following news that Norwegian…
The Literature Board of the Australia Council has announced the first three of eight recipients of their Book2 grants. The grants are worth $50,000 over three years and are intended to lessen the…
A leading Australian book retailer is getting into the publishing business with the launch of an online self-publishing service. Dymocks is the first major Australian book retailer to have entered…
The roll call of global literary luminaries gracing the Wheeler Centre this year was nothing less than astonishing. Let’s revisit some of the highlights of our international guests.In March, Annie…
Is it too soon? Just 11 years after it was first brought to screen, Bret Easton Ellis' novel American Psycho is set to be remade. Variety reported last week that Lionsgate has a remake of the film…
We’ve previously covered US President Barack Obama’s reading habits. Now Melbourne’s Grattan Institute has released a suggested summer reading guide for the Prime Minister. The thinktank has…
A new biography of Kurt Vonnegut has invoked a ill-tempered man consumed by bitterness and loneliness, a shadow of the avuncular persona well known to his adoring fans. The biography alleges that
In a recent story on future business models for online publishing and journalism, we quoted Maria Popova, editor of the website Brain Pickings, who advocates a pay-as-you-feel model to keep online…
The ABC’s television production of The Slap has been a high note in recent Australian drama. Christos Tsiolkas' eponymous novel has lost none of its sting in its journey from page to screen. In a…
A new UK publishing venture is bringing crowdfunding to the book world. Unbound lets authors pitch their novels-in-progress to readers, who then decide whether or not they want to contribute to the f…
Jane Gleeson-White talks about her third book, Double Entry: How the merchants of Venice shaped the modern world – and how their invention could make or break the planet. She describes the birth of t…
In 1984, American author Chris Van Allsburg published a book called The Mysteries of Harris Burdick. The highly unusual book consisted of a series of drawings with a title and a single line. The…
The State Library of Victoria is asking Victorians to help choose a book that describes the Victorian experience and can represent the state in the 2012 National Year of Reading ‘Our Story’ program.U…
“[A]lthough the Man Booker can change a writer’s life, a prize is only a prize,” Booker Prize judge Gaby Wood has written in the Telegraph. “It’s not an investigation, it’s not a work of criticism…
A picture really is worth a thousand words, creating new worlds and new readers. In this discussion, two of the craft’s leading exponents, Roland Harvey and Alison Lester, paint a picture of the…
In this Book Club event, Alan Brough will be discussing Kate Grenville’s The Lieutenant. The Lieutenant, a prequel of sorts to Grenville’s landmark novel The Secret River, is a vivid work of…
Eight years after his last novel, Seven Types of Ambiguity, Melbourne author Elliot Perlman returns with his latest book, The Street Sweeper. In just his fourth book, the acclaimed author and…
Its title is now a stock-standard phrase of the English language. It’s sold some 30 million copies since it was first published some 75 years ago. It single-handedly invented a new kind of book, one …
In his latest book, The Psychopath Test, British sleuth and documentary maker Jon Ronson comes across the influential psychologist who developed the industry standard ‘psychopath test’ and who is…
The inaugural Meanjin Tournament was a literary stoush like no other. The idea behind the tournaments is to pit classics against each other to determine one true candidate for the Great Australian…
Anita Shreve is the much-loved novelist and international sensation. She visits the Wheeler Centre fresh from her appearance at the Brisbane Writers Festival. Presented in partnership with the…
A bookshop in the Libyan capital Tripoli was among many businesses to reopen last week following the fall of the Gaddafi regime. But more than most, the owner is hoping that the inauguration of a…
The fifth annual Get Reading! campaign kicks off this week, hoping to get people reading one or more of 50 books throughout the month of September. Get Reading! is a month-long, nationwide campaign…
Germans are embracing the creation of “public bookshelves”. Deutsche Welle has reported on one such scheme in Cologne where volunteer-run structures the size of a small kiosk are stacked with books o…
This weekend is the last chance residents of and visitors to East Gippsland have to take in an exhibition of book art. The Books … beyond words exhibition at the East Gippsland Art Gallery in…
Congratulations to Fiona McGregor, whose third novel Indelible Ink was announced winner of The Age Book of the Year Award last night at the opening of the Melbourne Writers Festival. Indelible Ink
Screenshot from the trailer of Alfred Hitchcock’s Notorious [1946], via WikiCommons There are two kinds of people in this world: those who read the last page or two of a…
A Newsweek infographic listing every book US President Barack Obama has read since he ran for president in 2008 makes for interesting, er, reading. In September 2008, for example, Obama was reading…
Detail of San Francisco’s City Lights bookstore from the linocut, ‘Remarkable Collection of Angels’, from the blog Fiji Island Mermaid Press Saturday was National Bookshop…
Pioneering publications are giving us a glimpse of what the book of the future might look like – and that future can best be summarised as augmentation.1. The Hybrid BookIn the US, the New York…
For several years, publisher Allen & Unwin has accepted manuscript pitches from aspiring writers every Friday with a service it aptly called the Friday Pitch. Now Pan Macmillan has inaugurated its…
The first tablet was the iPad, right? Wrong. Developed in 1968, the first tablet was the Dynabook, and in some ways it was superior to the iPad. This is an excerpt from a piece by John Weldon on…
Imagine you are a publisher of serious literature and you receive a submission for a novel that goes something like this:“Cesar is a translator who’s fallen on very hard times due to the global…
This is a cross-post of a piece published on the blog ‘Alephantine’ by Alex Landragin.The ABC Radio National’s ‘Book Show’ yesterday broadcast a panel discussion called ‘The fact versus fiction…
Sophie Marozeau is a French journalist based in Melbourne. She is the founder of Emue Books, an innovative publishing house which promotes French books around the world. Emue books are available in…
The Wheeler Centre has a new neighbour, and it’s a bookstore. Following news of the closure of Borders, Angus & Robertson and Reader’s Feast, the operators of Embiggen hope that their…
All week we’re publishing reviews by Victorian librarians of titles shortlisted for the Premier’s 21. The reviews will be published by category, and today we publish reviews of titles shortlisted to …
Every day this week we’ll be publishing reviews of each of the Premier’s 21 titles shortlisted for the Victorian Premier’s Literary Awards. These reviews are not written by professional reviewers…
“To win book of the year after being a kid who had issues with reading and writing means maybe I’m not so bad at it,” Anh Do told ABC radio Tuesday. It was a quote reprinted in a report in The Age
“[A] reviewer is entitled to be spiteful as long as she is honest,” wrote Mr Justice Tugendhat last week in his summing-up notes of the first libel case against a national newspaper in the UK since 2…
The Booker Prize longlist for 2011 has been released. The judges chose books that include “one former Man Booker Prize winner; two previously shortlisted writers and one longlisted author; four…
After announcing the shortlists for the Victorian Premier’s Literary Awards yesterday, today we’re publishing the judges' comments for each title. Click here to be taken to the VPLA page and click…
The Age reports today on Anh Do’s awards win at last night’s Australian Booksellers' Association awards night. The report notes Do was named newcomer of the year, his memoir The Happiest Refugee
Victorian Premier Ted Baillieu announced the long shortlist for the 2011 Victorian Premier’s Literary Awards, which make up the first Premier’s 21. The premier noted the work of the judges, who had t…
The Hon. Ted Baillieu announces this year’s Victorian Premier’s Literary Awards shortlist — the Premier’s 21 — at The Wheeler Centre.Find out more about the awards and their background, or browse
Have you read Rohan Wilson’s bloodthirsty account of the ‘black wars’ in Tasmania, The Roving Party? Do you agree with Cordelia Fine’s take on the science of the sexes in Delusions of Gender? Are…
The Victorian premier Ted Baillieu announced the shortlists for the 2011 Victorian Premier’s Literary Awards this morning at the Wheeler Centre. In all, 21 books have been shortlisted across five…
Tony Wilson reflects on his eerie, and entirely unintended, prescience.My novel is coming true. It happened with my last novel too. No sooner had I written Players (Text 2005) – the story of a Sam…
“Flame is fleeting,” Napoleon said. “Obscurity is forever. I’ll take obscurity.” Of course, he did no such thing. But we couldn’t help but think of Napoleon’s quip while reading this piece in…
It’s 60 years since The Catcher in the Rye was published. Brigid Delaney, journalist and columnist, reflects on what the book means for her.I was 11 or 12. It was my mother’s book club novel and had …
Will they use a condom? Cover art of an historical romance novel by Tom Miller, c1960s, courtesy anoldent/Flickr It’s perhaps the most common controversy in the world of…
On the Booktopia blog, author Arnold Zable was asked ‘Ten Terrifying Questions’. The last of them is, what advice would you give aspiring writers? Zable replies: “Life comes first, writing second…
Affirm Press have just launched A Break in the Chain, the first novel by academic and author Tangea Tansley. Tansley was born in Zimbabwe into a family that boasted of its ancestral family links to P…
(Click to watch video.) He’s written 24 novels and created two of crime and mystery fictions best-known contemporary heroes, Harry Bosch and Micky Haller…
Our symphonies to Penguin Australia, who have had to pulp a cookbook because of a proofing oversight let a racially offensive term make it into print. The pulping of 7000 unsold copies of The Pasta…
We were saddened to learn that Reader’s Feast, on Swanston Street in Melbourne’s CBD, is closing. The 22 staff losing their jobs will bring the total amount of jobs lost by REDgroup’s insolvency to 1…
An opinion piece by Eric Felten published on the weekend in the Wall Street Journal has served as a reminder of the crucial role publishers play as a filter. Entitled ‘Cherish the Book Publishers &ndash…
In this edition of Texts in the City – the last with host Tony Wilson – writer and educator Tony Birch lends his knowledge of indigenous history to our understanding of Kate Grenville’s novel, The…
Dublin-born author Colum McCann has won the €100,000 International IMPAC Dublin Literary Award for his sixth novel, Let the Great World Spin. According to the judges' citation, the novel, set in…
Ramona Koval is joined by chefs Frank Camorra, Elizabeth Chong and Stephanie Alexander for the culinary journey of a lifetime. From Camorra’s Barcelona to Chong’s Hong Kong and Alexander’s beloved…
Screenshot from the trailer of Alfred Hitchcock’s Notorious [1946], via WikiCommons It’s Bloomsday. People all over the world – including Melbourne – are attending public r…
The Guardian has published a list of what its writers have judged the 100 greatest non-fiction books of all time. They’ve split the list into categories: art, biography, culture, environment…
Manning Clark is a giant of Australia’s cultural landscape. His impact and influence on our history and our way of understanding our history constitute a lasting legacy – which is exactly what Clark …
In this week’s Texts in the City, Lorin Clarke joins Tony Wilson to discuss justice, doubt and truth in Reginald Rose’s Twelve Angry Men.
Federal Minister for Small Business Nick Sherry predicted this morning that online shopping will wipe out bookstores within the next five years. Senator Sherry made the comments at the launch of a…
This week has been a veritable hotbed of controversy. Here’s our wrap.Amina Arraf, a lesbian Syrian blogger, was abducted by Syrian authorities during the week, prompting howls of protest around the …
Image via WikiCommons Sir Arthur Conan Doyle’s first novel, the reflective and loosely-structured Narrative of John Smith, is set to be published later this year by the…
(Click to watch video.) Michael Cunningham, the Pulitzer Prize-winning author of A Home at the End of the World, The Hours and Specimen Days, is a master…
Writer, reviewer and editor Matthia Dempsey joins Jenny Niven to discuss themes of class, faith, transformation and free choice in Geraldine Brooks' 17th century plague drama, Year of Wonders.We see …
Since 1986, the Frankfurt Book Fair, the global publishing industry’s biggest showcase event, has invited individual countries to be the Fair’s guest of honour. In 1986, it was India, the only…
In this Texts in the City event, writer and lecturer Emmett Stinson joins Jenny Niven to discuss the many ways of reading and interpreting Edgar Allan Poe’s open-ended stories in Great Short Works.St…
A volume of lavishly-illustrated drawings for children by a pioneering Australian woman will be auctioned next month. Charlotte Waring arrived in Australia in 1826 at the age of 29. She’d been hired …
Poster of a Coffs Harbour Amateur Theatrical Society adaptation of Cloudstreet A Perth-based fan of the Tim Winton classic Cloudstreet believes she’s narrowed the location …
PET image of a transaxial slice of the brain of a 56 year old male patient via WikiCommons A new book claims that, while one in 100 people in the general population are…
A portrait of Jane Austen sketched circa 1810 by her sister Cassandra at the National Portrait Gallery, London, via WikiCommons A rare Jane Austen manuscript will be…
This week’s edition of Texts in the City sees Jenny Niven talking to Australian Book Review editor Peter Rose about David Malouf’s 2009 novel Ransom.
‘The Peacock Skirt’, one Aubrey Beardsley illustration which did not land Bob Gould in legal hot water, via WikiCommons Booklovers across Sydney, and especially in the…
To paraphrase Mark Twain, reports of the book’s death have been greatly exaggerated.With all the news about of bookstores closing and Amazon swallowing every competitor in sight, we thought we’d…
Cover image of ‘Circus: The Australian Story’, by Mark St Leon Jugglers, lion-tamers, bearded ladies and freak shows – the world of the travelling circus is increasingly a …
In this video, Mandy Brett takes to Lunchbox/Soapbox to consider the future for those whom we notice least when they’re most effective: editors.Holding a Kindle, an iPad and a smartphone, Brett…
In his only Melbourne appearance, acclaimed author David Mitchell reveals himself to be an enthusiastic, gregarious and self-effacing guest, in conversation with Melbourne Writers' Festival…
Melbourne author Alison Goodman’s fantasy children’s book Eona has debuted at number five on the New York Times best-seller list in its category. The children’s chapter book best-seller list lists…
Joining Jenny Niven for Texts in the City is Louise Swinn, whose imprint Sleepers Publishing published the novel Things We Didn’t See Coming by Steven Amsterdam.Swinn reveals how she first…
“The two key rules that now govern the practice of Australian politics are: (1) look like you’re doing something; and (2) don’t offend anyone who matters.”In 2010, one of the Wheeler Centre’s most…
Four Australian author-illustrators of children’s books will be touring China this month and next as part of an initiative to promote the local industry in the Middle Kingdom. The tour, billed as…
Image of mid-1960s perfume set from the Soviet Union via WikiCommons Fashion icon Karl Lagerfeld is reportedly working on a new fragrance based on the smell of old books…
A kids' book with a twist is proving to be a pre-publishing phenomenon in the US. The book, Go the F—– to Sleep, is actually an adult cry for help, presented in a tongue-in-cheek spirit as a kids…
There are children’s books, and then there are children’s books that make a difference. The Boy and the Crocodile tells the story about East Timor’s national origins that doubles as a fable about…
The death of David Foster Wallace in September 2008 was a loss for readers everywhere. Foster Wallace’s unique brand of literary pyrotechnics made the LA Times dub him ‘one of the most influential…
(Click to watch video.) In this video of his only Melbourne public appearance, Sir Terry Pratchett, satirist, novelist and beloved icon, joined Michael…
Regretfully, we have been obliged to cancel this event because two of our panellists were unavailable. We hope to programme another event dedicated to this great Australian writer soon.Four-time…
Image of a storm breaking over Robinson, an outstation near Borroloola in the Northern Territory’s Gulf country, by Peter Nihill via WikiCommons. Publisher Simon &…
The shortlist for the Children’s Book of the Year has been announced. The awards – hosted by the Children’s Book Council of Australia – are the nation’s most prestigious. Congratulations to all…
Image of Keel’s Simple Diary covers via WikiCommons Though often derided, the diary is a distinguished literary form as well as a source of consolation. A new website…
Detail of an image by Christoph Michels via WikiCommons So you have this friend, the author.He’s writing a book. Or so he says. He spends years of working away in solitude …
The Australian Book Review has launched on online edition. Although ABR has long had a website with magazine information and excerpts, the online edition marks a new stage in the magazine’s online…
In this week’s Texts in the City, bookseller and novelist Peter Mews joins Jenny Niven in a discussion about Life of Pi, by Yann Martel.Together, they reveal layers of meaning in the text. Given…
Autobiography, memoir, life-writing: countless genres, countless approaches. Exposing one’s life experiences on the page seems somewhat daunting. From Kate Holden’s personal and romantic travails to …
If you pass the State Library lawns today and they seem to have a slightly crumpled look, you’re not hallucinating. It’s estimated that about 9,000 kids, parents and grandparents attended the…
In partnership with the State Library of Victoria..On Sunday April 3, your favourite authors and illustrators will be taking over the lawns of the State Library for a day of books, books, books…
All week we’ve run a series of articles on kids' and young adult books to coincide with the inaugural Children’s Book Festival this Sunday from 10am to 4pm.Today we finish the series by following up …
We add our congratulations to the long list of accolades for Shaun Tan, who’s backed up his Oscar win with the Astrid Lindgren Memorial Award. Worth 5 million krona ($765,000), it’s the world’s…
In partnership with Meanjin and Overland, we continue this series in 2011. With Amazon.com, ebooks and print-on-demand, are we seeing the end of the traditional bookstore? Are we facing a new…
Respected stage and screen actor Barry Otto joins Tony Wilson in this fifth Texts in the City session, this time looking at Louis Nowra’s Così.Drawing on Otto’s experience of playing colourful…
The conventional wisdom is that it’s usually wise to read the book before you see the film. But as filmmakers cast their sights further and further afield for inspiration, sometimes the film is…
In the lead-up to the Children’s Book Festival on Sunday, Chris Morphew is blogging this week on the website of ABC Radio National’s Book Show.Chris is a young adult author who’ll be appearing at…
Winners of the Book Trust’s Best New Illustrators Award have been announced in the UK. According to the Trust’s website, the winners – Joe Berger, Claudia Boldt, Katie Cleminson, Chris Haughton…
The United Kingdom’s Education Secretary has said he believes schoolchildren need to read much more. The Telegraph reports that Michael Gove has suggested kids in the latter years of primary school a…
A Federal Court judge in New York has rejected an agreement between Google, publishers and a group of about 40 libraries. Google has been digitising books in these libraries – which include Stanford …
Cover image via http://www.tkinter.smig.net/index.htm A building in central London believed to have been used as the model for a poorhouse in Charles Dickens' Oliver Twist …
A Long Island mansion believed to have inspired F. Scott Fitzgerald’s description of Daisy Buchanan’s abode is set to be razed. In the novel, the house is in East Egg and faces Gatsby’s palace in…
Image of Jeremy Bentham’s Panopticon via WikiCommons Jeffrey Archer is in town on March 22, in conversation with Jennifer Byrne at the Collins Street Baptist Church…
On the occasion in the UK of World Book Day (previously mentioned here) the Guardian asked 45 writers to nominate which books they like to give away. They received some fascinating replies. Salman…
One of our biggest themes here at Wheeler Centre Dailies in recent times has been the future of the book. JE Fishman at The Nervous Breakdown has given readers his take on the topic – and Fishman’s f…
The Wall Street Journal recently ran a piece on meta-books, or books about books. They’re the kind of book that appeal to people who are insatiably voracious readers – bibliovores. The lineage of…
Visitors of the New York Public Library’s Webster branch have been asked to cast aside their biases. The library has arranged a shelf to be displayed featuring books that have been covered in brown p…
In a New York Times article titled ‘The Problem with Memoir’, Neil Genzlinger revisits the genre in his review of 4 new memoirs, including Johanna Adorjan’s An Exclusive Love.Genzlinger outlines 4…
(Dunwich Marshes, Suffolk, via WikiCommons)Fans of WG Sebald’s melancholic masterpiece The Rings of Saturn will be curious to see how two English filmmakers have transposed the book for the screen. …
Common typefaces for the web Over at the Font Feed, there’s a fascinating article on typefaces. The blog has surveyed the winners of the annual Book, Jacket and Journal…
The award-winning book, Cement Garden Eminent British novelist Ian McEwan has been awarded Israel’s prestigious Jerusalem Prize. It’s the latest of a long list of…
Two e-readers (image courtesy of Bobbi Newman, via Flickr) Dianna Dilworth at eBookNewser wonders whether ebooks will change the way books are sold across regions.The…
Will Kindle e-books get the nod? In another sign that the digital book market is maturing, it now has its own industry awards. The Bookseller has launched the FutureBooks…
Over at the Wall Street Journal, Joanne Kaufman is looking at how authors are becoming their own marketing departments.Changes in technology are shrinking the profit margins – and marketing budgets…
The cover of Dylan’s first volume Readers who enjoyed Bob Dylan’s Chronicles: Volume One can look forward to the publication of volumes two and three, NME reports. In the k…
Sherlock Holmes is set to get a sequel written by screenwriter and author of the popular Alex Rider teen spy books Anthony Horowitz, according to a Guardian article.The new Holmes book will be set…
Following on the news that UK libraries are seeing large budget cuts and closures, comes the news of community-led protests against the moves. The Milton Keyes Citizen reports that the good…
An unauthorised sequel of JD Salinger’s Catcher in the Rye called 60 Years Later: Coming Through the Rye won’t be released in North America.Publisher’s Weekly reports that a settlement has been…
The Daily Show With Jon StewartMon - Thurs 11p / 10cMark Twain Controversywww.thedailyshow.comDaily Show Full EpisodesPolitical Humor & Satire…
Detail of a cover from The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn Last week the canon of American letters was re-written when Mark Twain’s The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn had…
The new year brings with it a fair share of crystal-balling about what the year ahead holds and according to the Independent the publishing industry has plenty of reasons to be cheerful.In an
Are e-books stacked against bookstores? The future is small for bookstores – in a good way according to a report from NPR. The report believes that “the big chains are in t…
Image by Alan Light (wikicommons) Oprah’s Book Club has given its seal of approval to the struggling British author Charles Dickens. Oprah has selected two little-known…
Backstage before a gig or killing time in the van, musicians love to read. Joining Ramona Koval are opera singer Ali McGregor, conductor Richard Gill and Oz rock legend Shane Howard along with their …
Way back in January pundits were calling 2010 the Year of the e-reader. Over at Read Write Web, they think the year has lived up to that promise with the appearance of the Kindle, Sony e-reader and, …
There’s trouble on the digital frontier of publishing as booksellers Dymocks announced to the ABC that they may move their online business overseas to remain competitive.Yesterday Dymocks chief…
Today Readings opens a new full store in the locker room area of the State Library. It represents a huge improvement on the small fold-away store that’s been in the foyer for most of 2010. The new…
Social Books on an iPad Reading is no longer a solitary affair and book clubs are moving online. The New York Times technology blog’s review of the Social Reading app…
US-based magazine Cooks Source has reproduced an article by Monica Gaudio without her permission, according to the blog How Publishing Really Works.Gaudio was informed by a friend that her 2005…
US book chain Barnes and Noble have announced they’ll release a new e-reader that’s creeping closer to being an iPad, according to GalleyCat.Unlike the Kindle the Nook Color promises a new high…
Ahead of the release of Emerging Writers' Festival The Reader, editor Aden Rolfe gives a sneak peek into the publication with this excerpt from his editorial: Aden Rolfe, editor of…
The Australia Council for the Arts has released a new report on the publishing industry, A case for literature: the effectiveness of subsidies to Australian publishers 1995-2005.As the title…
Food writing always seems so glamorous, but editor Rebecca Seal lifts the lid on the less steamy side of cookbooks in a piece for the Guardian.While editing A Year in the Kitchen with Britain’s…
In this session, Sisters Maryanne Confoy, Janette Gray and Mary Coloe join presenter Sarah L'Estrange to talk about how their reading habits have influenced their careers and enhanced their lives.The…
This week the US celebrates Banned Books Week by looking at what books have been challenged for inclusion in public libraries. The week is organised by the American Libraries Association (ALA) to…
A Fortunate Life, one of the titles Singo is set to save Australian advertising magnate, John “Singo” Singleton is looking to launch an all-Australian publishing venture…
Over at Slate, Jack Shafer is marking the decline in importance of books – both in the shrinking newspaper coverage and in the value of the printed object.Shafer remembers the glory days when the…
Image courtesy of el7bara US pastor Terry Jones has put away his gasoline and scrapped his plan to publicly burn the Koran, BBC News reports.The pastor from Dove World…
As book pages in capital city broadsheets lose real estate to real estate pages, Hilary McPhee, Rebecca Starford, Gideon Haigh and Peter Craven ask what’s wrong with literary criticism in Australia. …
Between the covers of our literary journals and weekend newspapers, reviewers shape what we read and buy. But as Gideon Haigh recently opined book reviewing is in trouble in Australia as reviewers…
Yesterday’s ALR in the Australian, ran an article on the state of Australian criticism by Geordie Williamson calling for a return to old-style reviewing and scholarship.Williamson has a hit list of w…
Author Gideon Haigh Everybody wants to go to heaven, as they say, but nobody wants to die. So it is in the world of book reviewing. Everyone is in favour of frank and…
Publisher Kabita Dhara Last week a new imprint appeared on Melbourne’s busy publishing scene, Brass Monkey Books, aiming to build closer ties between Australia and India.Pu…
Australian Booker nominee Christos Tsiolkas is cutting a swathe through Brit lit on his current visit to the UK with appearances at the Edinburgh International Book Festival.Not only is The Slap a…
The Observer announced its top ten cook books on Sunday creating a stir in culinary circles.Many of the big names missed out. Our Stephanie Alexander came in at 31 with her cooking bible, The Cook’s…
Charles and Meyer before meeting Easton Ellis Few authors attain rock star status, but Bret Easton Ellis' Australian tour has had it’s fair share of pyrotechnics and…
British writer George Orwell worked as a book reviewer but was always uncomfortable with the job. In this 1946 essay he argues that a book critic must “sell… honour for a glass of inferior sherry&rdquo…
Wondering what’s on your local bookseller’s mind? The 86th annual Australian Booksellers Association Conference has just finished in Brisbane this week and much of the talk was online.Angela Myer
Star literary agent Andrew Wylie has said that he’s prepared to take the licensing rights for his client’s e-books outside of print publishing and thinks the days of chain bookstores are numbered.Wyl…
Peter Temple has picked up Australia’s most celebrated prize, the Miles Franklin, for his crime book, Truth.It’s the first time a genre novel has won the literary gong and Text Publishing claims
Yesterday Harper Lee’s one and only book, To Kill a Mockingbird, turned 50, but the famously feisty author shows no signs of coming out of self-imposed exile.The BBC reports that the last request…
Forthcoming Wheeler Centre guest, Ayaan Hirsi Ali has been criticised by Ms. Magazine for failing to see women’s efforts to reform Islam.The article cites “her refusal to recognise the subjective…
Swedish novelist Stieg Larsson led a life as fascinating as his fiction, according an extract from The Man Who Left Too Soon by Barry Forshaw published in The Times.The book reveals Larsson had all …
The Miles Franklin Literary Award shortlist has been announced. Among those nominated is Sonya Hartnett for her book Butterfly. Sonya will be speaking with 3RRR's Donna Morabito next week at the…
The Spotlight on Graphic Novels event begins this Friday and runs for three days. The keynote address with Shaun Tan on Friday is booked out, however seats may be available at the door immediately…
The release of the American Library Association's "most challenged books of 2009" this week has created quite a stir. The Atlantic explains why the books that made it to the list are doing their job.
CNN contributor Bob Green writes about the importance of a good book cover in his article Book jackets: An endangered art.
The Guardian reports on the Pultzer prize for fiction going to Paul Hardings debut novel, Tinkers. The novel was published by small independent not-for-profit Bellevue Literary Press. …
Interestingly, the Wheeler Centre has already heard three of its visiting writers express very different opinions on Philip Roth.Roth, who has predicted that reading novels will have become a…
Two Australian have made the short list for the Lost Man Booker Prize.The Sydney Morning Herald says Patrick White, nominated for The Vivisector and Shirley Hazzard's The Bay of Noon fell through…
British writer David Almond is "stunned" to have won Children's literary award, the Guardian reports. [missing asset]
Ian McEwan’s latest novel Solar, published today, is a look at climate change through the eyes of a fairly unappealing, middle-aged scientist. Solar: Ian McEwan The…
Thomas Keneally's novel The People's Train, Peter Carey's Parrot And Olivier In America and Alex Miller's Lovesong have all been long-listed for this year's Miles Franklin award. …
Penguin has today announced the addition of 75 new titles to their iconic orange-and-white-covered popular classic roster, available from July 20 this year.The release celebrates 75 years of the…
Presented by The Wheeler Centre with the Australian Poetry Centre, Ezra Bix, aka Professor Petri P Podsapoppin PhD, hosts the Fed Square Book Market this Saturday. …
The Australian Literary Review surveys our politicians about their favourite books, with some interesting results. War and Peace: Leo Tolstoy
The very last tickets for Malcolm Fraser have now been released. Book here to see Fraser in conversation with co-writer Margaret Simons and George Megalogenis tonight. …
The New York Times reviews Lionel Shriver's latest novel, So Much for That, which takes a swipe at US health care and insurance policy, and the impact it can have on middle class families. …
The Australian Literary Review reports on the hoax that has France's best loved public philosopher, Bernard-Henri Levy, blushing. When Levy attacked Immanuel Kant in his latest book, On War in…
The New York Review of Books on Ben Mezrich's The Accidental Billionaires: The Founding of Facebook, A Tale of Sex, Money, Genius, and Betrayal and Stealing MySpace: The Battle to Control the Most…
The Observer publishes an extract from Patti Smith's new memoir, Just Kids. Patti Smith's Just Kids: Harper Collins
The Age reports that famously reclusive author, J D Salinger, has died at his home in New Hampshire. J D Salinger's Catcher in the Rye: Penguin
The Times Literary Supplement reviews Andrew Linzey's new book Why Animal Suffering Matters, which looks at the ethics of how humans use and treat animals.The …
Paul Barker's new book,The Freedoms of Suburbia, sings the praises of that most unfashionable of locales.And the Architects' Journal agrees. Freedoms of…
Colm Tóibín wins the Costa prize (formerly the Whitbread) for his novel Brooklyn.
December normally invites all kinds of 'year in review' type lists, and this year we have the added excitement of the end of a decade to contend with.This being the case, we have decide to start…
Jane Austen would have celebrated her 234th birthday today and while her novels might have thrived over the last 200 years, she died relatively young, in 1817.But, it seems, Austen lives on, or at…
The Sartorialist has been snapping locals in Sydney and Melbourne over the past week... we like Melbourne Man, even if he does seem to have forgotten his socks. …
The State Library of Victoria gives us its favourite 10 Victorian books, either by Victorians or set in Victoria, or both, for summer 2009-10. State Library…
The New York Review of Books on Google's plan to digitalise millions of books, presages the Wheeler Centre's debate on the same subject. Reading in a Time of…
Huge amounts have, predictably, been written about US Republican Sarah Palin's memoir Going Rouge, since its release last month. The Huffington Post is already…
There's been Pride and Prejudice and Zombies, now there's Sense and Sensibility and Sea Monsters.But not everyone can see the value in what the LA Times calls the "halloweenification of Jane…
Guardian books asks some of this year's most high-profile writers, a number of whom we hope to see at the Wheeler Centre next year, to pick their favourite books of 2009.
The New York Times reports today that Cormac McCarthy has decided to auction off his Olivetti Lettera 32 and donate the proceeds to the Santa Fe Institute, having written novels, plays, letters and s…
Residents of Somerset, in England, can now borrow books from what must be one of the world's smallest lending libraires.
