Please join us for the Book Launch of Emily Gallagher’s book Playtime: A History of Australian Childhood - Black Inc Books

To be launched by Australian actress, singer, author and television host Justine Clarke

About The Book

This groundbreaking book is a history of children’s play and imagination in Australia between 1890 and the Second World War. It is a story about the generations that grew up at a time when nation and empire were being reimagined amid the globalising currents of war, technology and trade. Theirs were faces that would remain forever young in monochrome film, and whose thoughts and dreams would be preserved between the timeless blue lines of the modern school exercise book.

The book is built around six imaginative worlds amateur journalism, bird loving, war and adventure, dolls, the future, and monsters and fairies. It brings these worlds, and the voices of children, to life, exploring an incredible array of children’s artefacts and seeing the social history of Australia through a new lens.

'In this brilliant study, Emily Gallagher reveals childhood imagination and play as at once traditional and modern, conservative and forward-looking – a realm of joy, fantasy and fear entangled with the adult world, yet a kingdom that children also claim as their own. Playtime is a book of striking richness, originality and creativity that will change your understanding of the possibilities of Australian social history.' —Frank Bongiorno, author of Dreamers and Schemers

‘Emily Gallagher’s beautiful new history illuminates the ways children have imagined their worlds through play. Emerging from years of careful and creative historical research, Gallagher offers a new lens through which to examine Australian history. Brimming with empathy and intelligence, Playtime is a remarkable feat of historical imagination.’ ––Michelle Arrow, co-author of Personal Politics

'Beautifully written, Playtime is an innovative history of children's imaginative play that takes children seriously in their own right and on their own terms.' —Hannah Forsyth, author of Virtue Capitalists

'A joy to read, this landmark study demonstrates the significance of children's creative play, restive imaginations and slumbered dreamworlds. Emily Gallagher has written an instant classic of Australian history, according her young protagonists a central place in the national narrative … Playtime showcases a treasure trove of sources to tell vital stories about social relations, change and continuity.' —Simon Sleight, author of Young People and the Shaping of Public Space in Melbourne, 1870–1914

About Emily Gallagher

Emily Gallagher is a historian and research editor at the Australian National University. Her PhD thesis was awarded the Serle Prize in Australian History and the Lyndall Ryan Prize in Australian Studies.

About Justine Clarke

Justine Clarke is one of the most recognised and trusted faces on the Australian entertainment landscape: a best-selling children’s singer and author, internationally acclaimed film star, seasoned stage actor - currently starring in the Sydney Theatre Company production of Julia, playing the role of Julia Gillard, and a constant, reassuring presence on the daytime TV institution, Play School.

This is a story of power and influence, pollution and protest. How does one company capture a country? How convincing is Woodside’s argument that gas is a necessary transition fuel, as the world decarbonises? And what is the new “”energy realism”” narrative being pushed by Trump’s White House?

On Thursday 25th September at the Red Mill Distillery, Balmain, join Marian Wilkinson in conversation with David Marr.

Copies of Woodside vs The Planet will be available for purchase at the venue through Roaring Stories, with Wilkinson signing copies after the discussion.

Join the national launch of Bob Brown’s new book, Defiance, for a conversation between Bob and Hannah Maloney, Gardening Australia host, permaculture educator, author, and activist.

For half a century, Bob Brown has been standing up to powerful interest groups that have put profit before planet. In Defiance, he draws on five decades of activism, from empowering a new wave of environmental defenders through Bob Brown Foundation, to the historic campaign to stop the Franklin River dam and his distinguished political career. Through stories brimming with courage, humour, and hard-won wisdom, Bob's powerful words consider the challenges facing activists, from industry lobbyists to rising consumerism, and reflect on his motivations to keep taking defiant action for Earth.

This is a rare opportunity to hear directly from two of Australia’s most inspiring environmental leaders, and get your copy of Defiance on the night.

Join Petrarch's Bookshop at Launceston Library as we launch Defiance by Bob Brown in conversation with Martin Flanagan.

Stories of courage and conviction from the environmental frontline. Told with Brown's trademark warmth and humour, these stories will galvanise, uplift and inspire.

For half a century, Bob Brown has been standing up to the powerful interests who would put profit before planet.

In Defiance, he draws on this experience to inspire a new generation of individual and collective action. He reflects on the people and places that have shaped him, celebrates the irreplaceable beauty and value of nature and shares what motivates him to keep fighting. He considers the challenges facing nature's defenders - hostile corporate lobbyists, vilification in the press, the powerful pull of consumerism –and shows how courage, persistence and community can defeat them all.

Ticket provides general admission to the talk.

Book sales and drinks available at the event.

State Library Victoria and Melbourne University present an evening celebrating one of Australia’s most acclaimed writers Alexis Wright with the launch of the final publication in the Writers on Writers Series: On Alexis Wright by literary critic Geordie Williamson. 

Williamson will be joined by award-winning author Tony Birch to discuss this eloquent essay which reflects with deep insight on Wright’s powerful work and influence on Australian literature. 

‘Wright deploys a particular set of approaches to the novel - the kind of sprawling, fabulist, experimental forms we associate with Latin American magical realism and European modernism - not only for formal effect but as an expression of the alternative ontological grounds of Indigenous existence. Alexis Wright doesn't just want to alter Australia's political valency. She aims to overthrow our way of being in the world.’ 

-Geordie Williamson, On Alexis Wright 

Registration is free but capacity is limited so book now to avoid disappointment. 

We invite you to stick around after the talk and peruse the books on offer by Readings. Both Geordie Williamson and Tony Birch will be available for signing. 

The Writers on Writers series is published by Black Inc. in association with the University of Melbourne and State Library Victoria. On Alexis Wright and the Writers on Writers series is available online and where all good books are sold. 

An insightful exploration of one of Australia’s most acclaimed writers, the award-winning Alexis Wright

‘Do you have a heart? her books ask. Is it still beating? Do you want to live? If the answer is yes, she says, then you’re with me. There is something exhilarating in the breadth of her church. For a congenital doomscroller with ancestor issues like myself, Wright opens a door to the potential for justice, comity and healing. It’s one I walk through with gratitude and relief.’

Winner of the Miles Franklin Literary Award in 2007 and 2024 and the Stella Prize in 2018 and 2024, Alexis Wright is the most eminent and influential Indigenous creative writer of recent times. In this eloquent essay, noted critic Geordie Williamson reflects with deep insight on Wright’s powerful work.

RSVP ESSENTIAL

The Wheeler Centre presents:

The former leader of the Greens shares stories of courage, conviction and the power of community from a life on the environmental frontlines.

For half a century, Bob Brown has been standing up to powerful interest groups that have put profit before planet. 

To celebrate the launch of his new book Defiance, he sits down to reflect on the people and places that have shaped him and shares what motivates him to keep fighting. He considers the challenges facing those who are dedicated to safeguarding life on Earth - from dealing with hostile corporate lobbyists, to press propaganda, to the powerful pull of consumerism - and shows how courage, persistence and community can defeat them all. 

Drawing on decades of experience and told with his trademark warmth and humour, these stories will galvanise, uplift and inspire a new wave of individual and collective action. With host Jeff Sparrow.

Former leader of the Australian Greens, Bob Brown, has been standing up to those who would put profit before planet for half a century.

In his new book, Defiance, he draws on his experience in the environment movement from his time as director of the Wilderness Society, protesting the Franklin Dam to his distinguished political career advocating for the environment. To inspire a new generation of individual and collective action, he considers the challenges facing nature’s defenders, from industry lobbyists to rising consumerism, and reflects on the motivations to keep fighting for our planet.

Be galvanised by Bob’s warmth and humour in this timely conversation. 

Presented by Sydney Writers' Festival.

One of Australia’s most esteemed historians, Sheila Fitzpatrick renders a pivotal period of modern history in forensic detail: the death of Joseph Stalin and the internecine power struggles between his successors. Fitzpatrick’s masterful and immensely readable account explores the far-reaching consequences of a dictator’s demise. 

Part of Brisbane Writers Festival.

A political institution unto himself, Bob Brown’s environmental activism has quite literally changed the Australian political landscape. In his new memoir, Brown reflects on life in activism and politics, providing a blueprint for a new generation seeking to challenge the powerful forces holding our collective humanity hostage.

Part of Brisbane Writers Festival.

Byron Writers Festival invites you to a special evening event with Bob Brown in conversation about his new memoir, Defiance.

For half a century, Bob Brown has been standing up to the powerful interests who would put profit before planet.‍

In Defiance: Stories from Nature and Its Defenders, he draws on this experience to inspire a new generation of individual and collective action. He reflects on the people and places that have shaped him, celebrates the irreplaceable beauty and value of nature and shares what motivates him to keep fighting. He considers the challenges facing nature's defenders – hostile corporate lobbyists, vilification in the press, the powerful pull of consumerism – and shows how courage, persistence and community can defeat them all.

Told with Brown's trademark warmth and humour, these stories will galvanise, uplift and inspire.

Defiance comes with a foreword by Geraldine Brooks.

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Books will be available for purchase and signing, presented by The Book Room.

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'Our unifying purpose ought to be safeguarding life on earth, honouring happiness and securing humanity for its future in the universe. This simple and obvious pursuit, far ahead of money, offers us meaning to life on our brilliant little planet.' — Bob Brown

For half a century, Bob Brown has been standing up to the powerful interests who would put profit before planet. In his new book Defiance, he draws on this experience to inspire a new generation of individual and collective action.

Hosted by Newcastle Writers Festival director Rosemarie Milsom.

The venue bar will open at 6.30pm.

Books will be for sale and there will be a signing after the event thanks to MacLean's Booksellers.

This event is presented in parternship with The University of Newcastle with support from Black Inc Books.

Adventurous journalists Brigid Delaney, bestselling author of Wellmania and Reasons Not to Worry, and Jenny Valentish, acclaimed author of Woman of Substances and Everything Harder Than Everyone Else, will talk about how existential dilemmas have stimulated some of their wildest escapades. As they discuss their latest books — Brigid’s book on Stoicism, The Seeker and The Sage, and reformed sociophobe Jenny’s The Introvert's Guide to Leaving the House — they’ll reveal the hard lessons and fraught truths that have made them two of Australia’s most compelling writers. With Tracee Hutchison.

Former Australian Greens leader Bob Brown casts an unflinching eye on the forces that have shaped him and the reasons why he’ll never stop fighting. Bob’s new book, Defiance, traverses his early days leading local environmental campaigns, to the national stage and federal parliament, all the while fighting for issues that matter. With Sophie Black.

Presented in partnership with the Bookshop at Queenscliff.

With the re-election of President Trump, America has entered a tumultuous new era of political strongmanship and an unravelling of previous approaches to foreign policy, climate action, human rights and more. With decades of US political expertise between them, Emma Shortis and Don Watson unpack what this new era means for Australia and the world. With Dylan Bird.

Presented in partnership with RMIT University.

We couldn't be more excited to present Meet the Author: Bob Brown for the launch of his new book, Defiance: Stories from Nature and Its Defenders. Bob, environmental and social justice campaigner and former senator, will be in conversation with Greens Senator, Sarah Hanson-Young, talking about stories of courage and conviction from the environmental frontline. We will be presenting Bob and Sarah, in partnership with the Burnside Library at 7pm on Thursday October 23rd at The Regal Theatre, 275 Kensington Road, Kensington Park.

Defiance draws on Bob's experience to inspire a new generation of individual and collective action. He reflects on the people and places that have shaped him, celebrates the irreplaceable beauty and value of nature and shares what motivates him to keep fighting. He considers the challenges facing nature's defenders – hostile corporate lobbyists, vilification in the press, the powerful pull of consumerism – and shows how courage, persistence and community can defeat them all. Told with Brown's trademark warmth and humour, these stories will galvanise, uplift and inspire.

Bob Brown is an environmental and social justice campaigner, former senator, and founding member of the Wilderness Society. From 1978 he led the successful campaign against the construction of the Franklin Dam. He served in Tasmanian state parliament for a decade, was leader of the Australian Greens, and in 1996 was elected to the federal Senate. His books include Memo for a Saner World and Optimism. After retiring from the Senate in 2012, he established the Bob Brown Foundation, a not-for-profit organisation supporting environmental causes.

Senator Sarah Hanson-Young is Greens Senator for South Australia and is a passionate environmentalist, community campaigner, feminist, and human rights activist. With over 17 years in the Parliament, Sarah has become one of the country's leading voices on women in politics, environmental protection, climate change, media laws and diversity, and human rights policy.

Tickets are $15 or you can purchase Ticket + Pre-Signed Book for $37 (Defiance is $37 RRP) with the book to be collected at the event. Defiance will be on sale for the night for $37. If you are unable to attend on the night, there is also a Book Only (signed) option available for $37 for SA addresses (signed book will be posted after the event). Part ticket proceeds donated to Bob Brown foundation.

Canberra Writers Festival presents:

Words, photos, paintings, plays and films all provide windows into our world. Each of our panellists has worked in different ways with the interaction between these forms and seeks to elevate and celebrate the space artists need to express their creativity. Gail Jones (The Name of the Sister) started as a visual artist and painter, coming later to the sensuous delight of words and now one of Australia's most prolific literary authors. Kate Grenville (Unsettled: A Journey Through Time and Place) began in film and has had fascinating experiences seeing her iconic Australian books translated to stage and screen. Quentin Sprague (What Artists See) writes exquisitely about art and offers glimpses into the lives of some of Australia's best contemporary artists. Together they reflect on their journeys and explore the question: what can images do that words can’t, and what can words do that images can’t? Moderated by writer and artist Kim Mahood. 

Canberra Writers Festival

A powerful and timely essay can wake us up. Esther Anatolitis, editor of Essays That Changed Australia, has identified some of the best from Meanjin over the decades. This session also celebrates the immense contribution regular pieces across key publications including The Monthly and Quarterly Essay have in shaping our political, social and cultural life. Esther will be joined by award-winning journalist, Marian Wilkinson (Woodside vs. the Planet: How a Company Captured a Country: Quarterly Essay 99) and long-time authority on the art of the essay and Keating speechwriter, Don Watson (Quarterly Essays High Noon and Enemy Within). Moderated by Michael Williams, editor of The Monthly.

Presented by Canberra Writers Festival

Today we bear witness to the end of so much previous generations took for granted. Our two authors explore what it takes to stay truly human in the face of global cataclysm, or within a world shrunk to the size of a box. Josephine Rowe’s Little World examines existence from the perspective of a saint, conscious in death; and Cadance Bell imagines a life lived post humanity in Letters to Our Robot Son. Together, our authors will show us what we stand to lose, and to gain, at the end of our old world. Moderated by Kaya Wilson.

Canberra Writers Festival presents

How can science and reason fight back against society’s growing fear and yet complacency? Vaccine denial is surging in countries around the globe, just as for the first time in human history, fatal diseases are on the verge of eradication. Elizabeth Finkel (Prove It) and Raina MacIntyre (Vaccine Nation) make a compelling case that defending the scientific method of inquiry is a matter of life and death today, and for future generations. Join Elizabeth and Raina, moderated by ABC TV news editor Tracey Kirkland (author of Pandemedia), in the fight to save scientific progress.

Canberra Writers Festival Presents

Kate Grenville’s ancestors were ‘the sharp edge of the moving blade’ of colonisation through the Hawkesbury region – the subject of her bestseller The Secret River. Now in Unsettled: A Journey Through Time and Place, she reflects on the reckoning that comes with truly confronting the past and her family story. She’s joined by Paul Daley, whose novel The Leap examines fear and violence in a frontier town. Two years after the Voice referendum, this timely conversation is about non-Indigenous Australians doing the work and personally reckoning with the past.

Canberra Writers Festival Presents

We've all seen the chaos, standover tactics and unlikely new ‘friends’ come and go. But what sort of political and economic system allowed Donald J Trump to reach the pinnacle of power...twice? How does understanding America and key moments in its foreign policy history help us work out what is going on now? Are we in totally unchartered waters? Join this expert America-watching panel of Don Watson (author of no fewer than three Quarterly Essays on American culture and politics and forthcoming work, The Shortest History of the United States of America), Professor Amin Saikal (How to Lose a War: The Story of America’s Intervention in Afghanistan) and Clinton Fernandes (Turbulence: Australian Foreign Policy in the Trump Era), moderated by Allan Behm, International & Security Affairs advisor at The Australia Institute, as they look back, project forward and try to make sense of it all.
 

Canberra Writers Fesitval presents

For half a century, Bob Brown has been on the frontline of environmental protection, Australian politics and collective action to safeguard and celebrate our precious earth. His direct activism has inspired generations of environmental defenders and saved immeasurable tracts of pristine wilderness for future Australians to discover. In his new memoir Defiance, Bob sets out why it’s now more important than ever to speak up and fight for environmental and land justice. Sarah Hanson-Young, Greens Senator for South Australia, will join Bob for this special conversation about the challenges facing nature's defenders and what motivates him to keep fighting.

Bob Brown is an environmental and social justice campaigner and former senator. A founding member of the Wilderness Society, from 1978 he led the successful campaign against the construction of the Franklin Dam. He served in Tasmanian state parliament for a decade, was leader of the Australian Greens, and in 1996 was elected to the Federal Senate. His books include Memo for a Saner World and Optimism. After retiring from the Senate in 2012, he established the Bob Brown Foundation, a not-for-profit organisation supporting environmental causes. His latest book is Defiance: Stories from Nature and its Defenders.

Saul Griffith (Plug In!) is Australia's leading voice on the switch to renewable power. In this workshop he takes us, step by step, through his new handbook to electrify our lives. Saul will make ditching coal and gas simple: where to source electricity, how to heat your home, keep your shower hot, and travel conveniently and comfortably. If you want to make the switch to a renewable energy life, but are intimidated by the apparent complexity and hurdles, this workshop-style conversation is for you. Moderated by Stephen Corby, journalist and former editor of Top Gear and Wheels and co-founder of EV Central.

Saul Griffith is an engineer and entrepreneur specialising in clean and renewable energy technologies. Over two decades in Silicon Valley, he has founded more than a dozen technology companies. He is the author of three books, including Electrify, The Big Switch, and his most recent release Plug In!. Saul has shifted his focus from his R&D lab, Otherlab, to public policy and advocacy, founding Rewiring America, Rewiring Australia, and Rewiring Aotearoa, non-partisan organisations dedicated to electrification and decarbonisation and the associated policy and regulatory implications of meeting our climate goals.

Canberra Writers Festival presents

The shadows cast by past dictatorships loom long and large. What do the reigns of Stalin and Mao have to teach us about the threats faced by nations and peoples today? We need to remind ourselves of the past. Linda Jaivin (Bombard the Headquarters! The Cultural Revolution in China) and Sheila Fitzpatrick (The Death of Stalin & Lost Souls: Soviet Displaced Persons and the Birth of the Cold War) examine what unrestrained power can do to a leader and the nations they rule. The lessons for our current era are inescapable. Moderated by Kyle Wilson, Visiting Fellow at the ANU Centre for European Studies.

Canberr Writers Festival presents

Women everywhere are noticing signs of backlash after all the feminist progress forged in the 1960s-70s. Misogyny, rising rates of domestic violence, winding back of abortion rights… Women are in an unfinished revolution and the stakes could not be higher. This is the intimate but LOUD conversation we need to have that sets out the radical history of women’s liberation in Australia, tells hard truths about family violence, and issues a war cry for all women and girls. Above all, it will be a celebration of womanhood. 

Join journalist and author Virginia Haussegger, gender violence expert and journalist Jess Hill and award-winning author and poet Maxine Beneba Clarke for an honest chat that will also give YOU a chance to ask questions and be a part of the discussion. Moderated by Canberra author, artist and performance poet, Jacqui Malins.

Canberra Writers Festival presents

Something magical happens when beautiful writers approach the topic of the sacred and divine and tell a tale replete with human desire and frailty. In Little World, Josephine Rowe travels with a girl saint through North-west Australia in the 1950s all the way through to the onset of Covid in Victoria. Emily Maguire took the literary scene by storm with Rapture, the story of a medieval girl who rises to become a Pope, and all the twists and turns and qualities that would have needed to unfold in her life to make it so. Here they are in conversation with Canberra author, Tabitha Carvan.

Canberra Writers Festival presents

Pleasure should be a simple thing but a lot of the time – it isn’t! Perhaps the plot of sweet romance and erotic fiction books contain part of the answer? Cue the handsome prince, male best friend, girl next door, or something else altogether... whatever you fancy! 

Join Rachael Johns (Queen of Aussie Romance), Linda Jaivin (Erotic novelist from the get-go) and superstar locals, Alyx Gorman (All Women Want) and Freya Marske (author of queer romantic fantasy) as they talk romance, fantasy and sex! This is going to be fun... Moderated by Books+Publishing’s Kate Cuthbert.

Canberra Writers Festival presents

Objects and records tell tales, spark imagination and are fascinating sources of social history. In Playtime: A History of Australian Childhood, Emily Gallagher explores the history of childhood play and imagination in Australia, with reference to the toys and artefacts that inspired generations growing up between the 1890s and WW2. After thirty years confined within museum walls, Anne-Marie Condé, a restless history curator, steps out for air with The Prime Minister’s Potato and Other Essays. She tours cemeteries, war memorials and junk shops asking fresh questions about the significance of objects and places. A session for those who love hearing about precious objects and the stories they contain. Moderated by Kathryn Favelle.

Canberra Writers Festival presents

Jenny Macklin was known as a Minister on a Mission and implemented life-changing reforms for many Australians through the Rudd & Gillard eras. Now she issues her must-read book Making Progress: How Good Policy Happens on how to lock in progressive change and deliver on-the-ground results. Sarah Hanson-Young is Greens Senator for South Australia and is a passionate environmentalist, community campaigner, feminist, and human rights activist. With over 17 years in the Parliament, Sarah has become one of the country's leading voices on women in politics, environmental protection, climate change, media laws and diversity, and human rights policy.

There is no shortage of big policy issues that must be tackled in Australia including family violence and rising inequality. Together the panel will bring different perspectives on how to create impetus for much needed big ideas and bold reforms. And deliver!  This is an essential session for politics-watchers, public service reformers and engaged community members alike. Moderated by Jess Hill who will draw on years of experience working with government, researchers and the community sector trying to achieve better outcomes for families and communities.  

Canberra Writers Festival presents

What's the true cost of progress, and what do we lose in trying to attain it? Facing a rapidly approaching Artificial Intelligence existence, Big Tech promises that geoengineering, nanotech and AI can solve our health, environmental and social crises. So why does it feel so dystopian? In Brave New Wild, Richard King shows us that corporations and governments are attempting to remake nature itself – and could break the foundational connection that sustains us as a species. In her novel One Story, Pip Finkemeyer dives into the power of narrative in an AI world, and a turning point for Big Tech in the 2010s that paved the path we are on today. Saul Griffith lives in labs and boardrooms trying to harness the power of innovation, tech and corporate might for good – because if innovation can’t save us, what can? Moderated by Jennifer Mills (Salvage).

The Australia Institute Webinar

For half a century, Bob Brown has been standing up to the powerful interests who would put profit before planet.

In Defiance, he draws on this experience to inspire a new generation of individual and collective action. He reflects on the people and places that have shaped him, celebrates the irreplaceable beauty and value of nature and shares what motivates him to keep fighting. He considers the challenges facing nature’s defenders – hostile corporate lobbyists, vilification in the press, the powerful pull of consumerism – and shows how courage, persistence and community can defeat them all.

Told with Brown’s trademark warmth and humour, these stories will galvanise, uplift and inspire.

About the author

Bob Brown is an environmental and social justice campaigner and former senator. A founding member of the Wilderness Society, from 1978 he led the successful campaign against the construction of the Franklin Dam. He served in Tasmanian state parliament for a decade, was leader of the Australian Greens, and in 1996 was elected to the federal Senate. His books include Memo for a Saner World and Optimism. After retiring from the Senate in 2012, he established the Bob Brown Foundation, a not-for-profit organisation supporting environmental causes.

Did AI write this event copy? Can you tell, and does it matter? And as machines grow ever more capable, what – if anything – remains uniquely human? Drawing on expansive imaginations and deep research, our panel considers how AI is reshaping our identities, work, ethics and creativity. 

In The Thinning, Inga Simpson imagines a future where mass extinctions and dwindling diversity threaten what's left of our environment, introducing us to a new breed of evolved humans, the Incompletes. In Cadance Bell’s Letters to Robot Son, we are thrust even further through time to a desolate world devoid of humanity, where a robot with no memory embarks on a quest to understand its existence. Meanwhile, back in 2025, Toby Walsh’s global advocacy for limits to ensure AI enhances – rather than threatens -- our lives, has led to him being banned indefinitely from Russia.

Don’t miss these big, bold, deeply human brains, in conversation with ABC Sydney’s Rae Johnston.

After the success of her two best known works, The Secret River, adapted for stage and television, and Restless Dolly Maunder, shortlisted for the Women’s Prize for Fiction, literary legend Kate Grenville is still grappling with what it means to be a descendant of colonisation in Australia.

Delve deep with Kate as she reframes her family’s history in Unsettled: A Journey Through Time and Place, and asks, ‘what does it mean to be on land that was taken from other people? Now that we know how the taking was done, what do we do with that knowledge?’

Kate Grenville has published 18 books. Her nine novels include the bestseller The Secret River, which was shortlisted for the Booker Prize. Others have also won international and Australian prizes, been adapted for stage and screen, and appear in translation. Kate's non-fiction work includes biographies and books about the writing process. Her latest book is Unsettled: A journey through time and place. 

Nicole Abadee is an interviewer, facilitator and journalist who writes for Good Weekend Magazine, Harpers Bazaar, Spectrum and Australian Book Review. She has been a regular interviewer at writers’ festivals including Sydney Writers Festival, Adelaide Writers Week and Canberra Writers Festival. She was the curator of the Woollahra Writers’ Festival 2025. Nicole has been a literary judge, podcaster and a guest on ABC Radio to discuss books. She is a board member of the Indigenous Literacy Foundation.

Twenty years from now, what is the best-case scenario for humanity? What about the worst-case scenario? Maybe a middle ground? While discussions of our future(s) are often rightly focused on climate change, we’ve brought together experts in lifestyle, politics and evolving technologies to play a little game of hypotheticals, discussing how their extensive research informs their hope – or despair – for the decades to come. 

Get back to the future, with Director of the Lowy Institute’s International Security Program Sam Roggeveen and Chief Scientist of UNSW.AI, UNSW’s new AI Institute Toby Walsh, in conversation with Lifestyle Editor at Guardian Australia and author of All Women Want Alyx Gorman.

Yes, it probably is. 

Don’t miss this timely discussion, with Sam Roggeveen, author of The Echidna Strategy: Australia’s Search for Power and Peace and director of the Lowy Institute's International Security Program; Carl Rhodes, Professor of Business and Society at UTS Business School and author of Woke Capitalism: How Corporate Morality is Sabotaging Democracy, and Melissa Phillips, WSU Senior Lecturer in Social Sciences and Acting Director, Policy and Research for the Whitlam Institute.

Democratically wrangled by facilitator Beejay Silcox, this event is presented in partnership with the Whitlam Institute.

For half a century, Bob Brown has been standing up to the powerful interests who would put profit before planet. In Defiance, he draws on this experience to inspire a new generation of individual and collective action.

He reflects on the people and places that have shaped him, celebrates the irreplaceable beauty and value of nature and shares what motivates him to keep fighting. He considers the challenges facing nature’s defenders – hostile corporate lobbyists, vilification in the press, the powerful pull of consumerism – and shows how courage, persistence and community can defeat them all.

Told with Brown’s trademark warmth and humour, these stories will galvanise, uplift and inspire.

Join Emily Gallagher as she introduces her book Playtime: A History of Australian Childhood.
Children’s play has long been an important part of Australia’s cultural landscape. It is how we learn to live, to forge friendships and to make sense of the world. In this talk, Emily Gallagher delves into the imaginative lives of the children that grew up in the early-to-mid twentieth century. It is a story about young dreamers and aspiring journalists, old schoolrooms and backyard cubbies, war and modernity, sibling rivalries and intergenerational alliances, and the enduring power of the imagination to defy the routine and powerlessness of everyday life.

The history of Australia has been written before – but not like this. Mark McKenna’s wise and humane history reveals the surprising in the familiar, and reframes the past so we can see the present more clearly.

On Tuesday 11th November at The Royal Oak, Balmain, join Mark McKenna in conversation with Anna Clark.

Copies of The Shortest History of Australia will be available for purchase at the venue through Roaring Stories, with McKenna signing copies after the discussion.

Hosted by Roaring Stories. 

Join Readings for 24-hours celebrating books, culture and community

La Mama Salon is a series of intimate conversations at La Mama theatre. Seating only 30 people, it’s a space designed for confessions and creations.

Join us to hear Moreno Giovannoni in conversation with Arnold Zable about The Immigrants.

In The Immigrants, Giovannoni depicts a family as they build a new life in a strange land. Through love and exile, industry and tragedy, their unspoken dreams and fears unfold in this astonishing and moving book.

The Readings pop-up bookshop will be open at this event.

Tickets are $20 per person. Very limited spots.

Join Readings for 24-hours celebrating books, culture and community

We are delighted to invite you to a conversation between Quentin Sprague and Eric Jensen about What Artists See.

Quentin Sprague is an award-winning author and art critic. His work appears widely, including regularly in The Monthly. His latest collection of essays, What Artists See, offers glimpses into the lives of Australia’s best contemporary artists, exploring the impetus for creativity and the role of art in making meaning of this place and time. 

Erik Jensen is an award-winning journalist, biographer, screenwriter and poet. He is the founding editor of The Saturday Paper.

The Readings pop-up bookshop will be open at this event.

Join Readings for 24-hours celebrating books, culture and community

We are thrilled to have Sean O’Beirne introducing a discussion between Don Watson and Dr Emma Shortis about the United States of America. 

Don Watson is the author of many acclaimed books. His latest work, The Shortest History of the United States of America, tells the extraordinary story of the United States, a nation that contains multitudes. Full of character and humour and told with great learning and insight, it’s a perfect introduction to America, past and present.

Dr Emma Shortis is director of the Australia Institute’s international and security affairs program and a historian, focused on the history and politics of the United States and its role in the world. Her latest work, After America, draws on her longstanding research on America's place in the world. Now that the people of the United States have elected Donald Trump as their president, how will his presidency affect Australia? More importantly, will Australia be able to act in its own interests, or will it simply defer to Trump's idea of America?

Sean O'Beirne is an author, bookseller and critic.

Join Avid Reader for an author talk by Don Watson about The Shortest History of the United States of America

ABOUT THE BOOK

The extraordinary story of the United States, a national that contains multitiudes

When Britain's thirteen American colonies declared their independence on 4 July 1776, the United States of America was born. But it was hardly united.

In this superbly written book, Don Watson traces how the central conflicts of the United States – those over freedom, race, frontiers, enterprise, religion and violence – play out throughits history: a country at war with itself in the 1860s, the leader of the free world less than a hundred years later, and a nation beset by wild division and turmoil in the twenty-first century.

This is a story full of character and humour, told with great learning and insight – a perfect introduction to America, past and present.

'These were indeed strange times. Yet the forces at work in them were not new. Men like Donald Trump are embedded in US history, mythology and popular culture. Rank populists, hucksters, fakers, grifters, rent-seekers, blowhards, tycoons, kleptocrats, narcissists, psychopaths and delinquents – or, from the other point of view, rugged individualists, entrepreneurs, men of vision, men of destiny, instruments of God. No diorama of mainstream American life in any era could be without them.'—Don Watson, The Shortest History of the United States of America.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Don Watson is the author of many acclaimed books, including Caledonia Australis, Recollections of a Bleeding Heart, American Journeys, The Bush, Watsonia and The Story of Australia.

Join us for an author talk by Don Watson about The Shortest History of the United States of America

ABOUT THE BOOK

The extraordinary story of the United States, a national that contains multitiudes

When Britain's thirteen American colonies declared their independence on 4 July 1776, the United States of America was born. But it was hardly united.

In this superbly written book, Don Watson traces how the central conflicts of the United States – those over freedom, race, frontiers, enterprise, religion and violence – play out throughits history: a country at war with itself in the 1860s, the leader of the free world less than a hundred years later, and a nation beset by wild division and turmoil in the twenty-first century.

This is a story full of character and humour, told with great learning and insight – a perfect introduction to America, past and present.

'These were indeed strange times. Yet the forces at work in them were not new. Men like Donald Trump are embedded in US history, mythology and popular culture. Rank populists, hucksters, fakers, grifters, rent-seekers, blowhards, tycoons, kleptocrats, narcissists, psychopaths and delinquents – or, from the other point of view, rugged individualists, entrepreneurs, men of vision, men of destiny, instruments of God. No diorama of mainstream American life in any era could be without them.'—Don Watson, The Shortest History of the United States of America.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Don Watson is the author of many acclaimed books, including Caledonia Australis, Recollections of a Bleeding Heart, American Journeys, The Bush, Watsonia and The Story of Australia.