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Birdbrain (Kelli Anne Hawkins, HarperCollins)
Released September 2022
In her return to middle-grade fiction, Kelli Anne Hawkins delivers another madcap caper for 10- to 12-year-olds that has puns aplenty and some genuine chuckles. Hadley Boggs is 11 and... Read more
Paper Cage (Tom Baragwanath, Text)
Released September 2022
Paper Cage is a thrilling whodunnit and the winner of the 2021 Michael Gifkins Prize. The story centres on Lorraine, a records clerk at a small-town police department. She’s bright... Read more
Naturopolis (Deborah Frenkel, illus by Ingrid Bartkowiak, Storytorch Press)
Released September 2022
The narrative nonfiction genre of children’s books—particularly those exploring the natural world—seems to be growing, and it can be hard to get right, since the audience for the ‘story’ component... Read more
Curlews on Vulture Street (Darryl Jones, NewSouth)
Released September 2022
A fascination with birds and wildlife took hold early for Darryl Jones. Now a professor of ecology at Griffith University, he first noticed the creatures who shared his landscape as... Read more
Dirt by Sea (Michael Wagner, illus by Tom Jellett, Puffin)
Released September 2022
When Daisy mishears the lyrics of the national anthem, Dad declares a road trip in Mum’s Kombi to show her that Australia is an island, girt by sea, even if... Read more
Honour Among Ghosts (Sean Williams, A&U)
Released September 2022
Honour Among Ghosts is a high-action historical mystery set in a small Irish village where there are sorcerers, moralistic ghosts and spell-scribbling scribes. When 12-year-old Penny’s working-class father is thrown... Read more
Dancing Barefoot (Alice Boyle, Text)
Released September 2022
Dancing Barefoot brings a warm and uplifting queer contemporary romance to the #LoveOzYA, #AusQueerYA and #OwnVoices scenes. Winner of the 2021 Text Prize, Alice Boyle’s debut novel follows Patti ‘Patch’... Read more
Be Careful, Xiao Xin! (Alice Pung, illus by Sher Rill Ng, Working Title Press)
Released September 2022
The bilingual picture book Be Careful, Xiao Xin! shows us how hard it can be for a young child to move towards independence and for a family to keep their... Read more
Wildflowers (Peggy Frew, A&U)
Released September 2022
When we first meet 37-year-old Nina Atkins, the protagonist of Peggy Frew’s Wildflowers, she’s going through a strange time: she’s packing all her possessions into boxes, stealing clothes from the... Read more
Farm: The making of a climate activist (Nicola Harvey, Scribe)
Released September 2022
Is it possible to be a meat-eating environmentalist? How do you spend months bonding with your heifers, seeing them as they truly are—curious, playful and happy sentient beings—just to send... Read more
Cautionary Tales for Excitable Girls (Anne Casey-Hardy, Scribner)
Released September 2022
Office assistants team up to steal leftover food from corporate meetings; teenage girls deal with uninvited boys during a schoolies camping trip; children play under the sinister branches of a... Read more
Desi Girl (Sarah Malik, UQP)
Released September 2022
Desi Girl is a collection of memoir-style essays by Pakistani-Australian journalist Sarah Malik. The essays primarily chronicle Malik’s university years, taking the reader through pivotal moments during this time before... Read more
The Accident (Katie McMahon, Echo)
Released September 2022
In this second general fiction offering from the author of The Mistake, Katie McMahon provides a tangled web of 30- and 40-something characters, with overt crumbs leading to a trail... Read more
The Only Child (Kayte Nunn, Hachette)
Released September 2022
The Only Child is historical fiction-cum-murder mystery by Kayte Nunn. The novel follows two timelines and the reader is tasked with piecing together the connection between them. In the first... Read more
A Little Spark (Barry Jonsberg, A&U)
Released August 2022
A Little Spark is the latest middle-grade novel from author Barry Jonsberg. Known for his novels My Life as an Alphabet and A Song Only I Can Hear, Jonsberg again... Read more
This Devastating Fever (Sophie Cunningham, Ultimo)
Released September 2022
Alice Fox has been struggling for years with her novel. Her agent, Sarah, has misgivings. Does anyone really want to read about Virginia Woolf’s husband, Leonard Woolf? Alice claims that... Read more
Our Dreaming (Kirli Saunders, illus by Dub Leffler, Scholastic)
Released August 2022
This isn’t the first time that Gunai writer, poet and activist Kirli Saunders and Bigambul illustrator Dub Leffler have created something incredible together. It’s no surprise after the success of... Read more
The Cast Aways of Harewood Hall (Karen Herbert, Fremantle Press)
Released September 2022
On the picturesque grounds of Harewood Hall, a retirement village in Perth’s western suburbs, something is afoot. Actually, a variety of things are afoot, and the residents of Harewood Hall... Read more
The Book of Wondrous Possibilities (Deborah Abela, Puffin)
Released August 2022
The Book of Wondrous Possibilities starts with a bang and doesn’t let up. Arlo lives a quiet life with his uncle and pet mouse Herbert above their bookshop, until the... Read more
Growing in to Autism (Sandra Thom-Jones, MUP)
Released September 2022
Sandra Thom-Jones had a successful life before she knew she had autism. Or, more specifically, before she had a diagnosis of autism. A well-respected researcher in her 50s, Thom-Jones knew... Read more
