With the upcoming announcement of this year’s winner, our Children’s Prize shortlist authors talk about their inspiration, the creative process, their perfect reader, their favourite writing advice and what they hope readers take away from their books.

Want to know more about each shortlisted title? Explore the shortlist here.

What was the initial inspiration for your story?

Neridah McMullin (Evie and Rhino): I love reading about shipwrecks. Not only reference books, but online through the State…

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Each week our amazing staff bring you a sample of the books or music they're immersed in.

Lian Hingee is reading Emily Wilde's Encyclopedia of Faeries by Heather Fawcett

I don't know if it's the general dreadful state of the world, the awfulness of the news, or the looming dread of climate catastrophe, but there's been a really big uptick in 'cosy' iterations of my favourite genres, and I for one am here for it. People being nice to each…

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Alicia from Readings Kids recently had the exciting opportunity to interview YA fantasy superstar Megan Whalen Turner and below is the transcript of what transpired.

Thank you so much for allowing me the opportunity to ask you some questions on behalf of Readings. Before I get into those I just wanted to tell you how much I love your books and how much they have meant to me. I began reading the Queen’s Thief series when I was 14 and…

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The shortlist for this year’s Goldsmiths Prize has been announced! This prize was established in 2013 to celebrate the qualities of creative daring and to reward fiction that breaks the mould or extends the possibilities of the novel form. You can learn more about the history of the prize here.

The six titles shortlisted for the 2023 Goldsmiths Prize are:

Lori & Joe by Amy Arnold

The Long Form by Kate Briggs

Never Was by Gareth H. Gavin

…

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The finalists for the 2023 National Book Awards have been announced! Established in 1950, the National Book Awards are American literary prizes administered by the National Book Foundation. The awards currently cover the categories of Fiction, Nonfiction, Poetry, Translated Literature, and Young People's Literature. The five finalists for each category were selected by a panel of judges.

Finalists for Fiction:

Chain-Gang All-Stars by Nana Kwame Adjei-Brenyah

Temple Folk by Aaliyah Bilal

This Other Eden by Paul Harding

The End of…

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As years go by, time after time, humans around the world are drawn to the same books, connecting us from every corner of the globe: some notable examples include plays, such as Romeo and Juliet by Shakespeare, classic novels such as Jane Austen's Pride and Prejudice and Agatha Christie's And Then There Were None, as well as Crime and Punishment by Fyodor Dostoevsky, to name a few.

But why should we be chained to the books of our past…

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Friends, October is officially O for Overwhelming. I spend each one of these columns trying to cover as many new releases as I can, but there are so many great books published this month, my task is D for Doomed, and omissions will be legion. Let me start at a logical point though, with our Fiction and Nonfiction Books of the Month, both of them undoubtedly two of the publishing highlights of 2023.

Edenglassie is Melissa Lucashenko’s long-awaited follow-up to…

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Readings Carlton bookseller Jason Austin decided to return to a genre he’d enjoyed as a young reader and exclusively read horror books in 2023. Here he shares the results of his experiment.

Like a lot of kids, my love of reading began with comics, but sci-fi and horror were my gateway to reading long-form literature. Horror, in particular, was a genre I was hooked on as a child, and it started with Roald Dahl.

I don’t mean The BFG or…

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Each week our amazing staff bring you a sample of the books or music they're immersed in.

Baz Ozturk is reading Cold Nights of Childhood by Tezer Özlü & Maureen Freely (trans.)

Translated and published into English for the first time this year, this modern Turkish classic is a beautiful, brutal and surprisingly life-affirming novella. It’s the story of a woman – in and out of psychiatric wards, being forcefully treated with electroshock therapy – struggling to assert her will…

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Olivia from our Teen Advisory Board has curated a selection of all-time favourite fantasy novels to tempt you.

Fantasy novels are totally immersive. They’re perfect for staying up late over summer (or during term!), to read on the tram home from school, or really, just to crack open in any situation! Below are four fantasy books I highly recommend escaping into.

Strange the Dreamer by Laini Taylor

This is the book that made me fall in love with fantasy; strange…

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