Archives par étiquette : Text Publishing

BIRD DEITY de John Morrissey

A scout retrieving artifacts from an ancient species on a distant planet sets out on a search for his missing mentor.

BIRD DEITY
by John Morrissey
Text Publishing Australia, August 2026

David is a scout. For ten years he has plundered the ruins of an alien civilisation about which he knows nothing. Now his contract is ending, and he’s ready to go home, a wealthy, successful man.

Except that everything seems to be slipping out of his control. His mentor Tom vanished on a recent expedition. David doesn’t know what has happened to him. And, as he waits for the ship that will take him away, he begins to question the choices he has made.

That’s when he is visited by a researcher, a specialist in non-human societies. She has travelled far to learn about this strange world and wants to hire David as her guide. One more expedition, one more trip to the rainswept wasteland of the plateau—and he can go home at last, rich beyond his dreams.

But he comes to realise that he may yet lose everything, as he is drawn inexorably towards an encounter with the terrifying soul of this world.

John Morrissey’s BIRD DEITY is a novel like no other. At once disconcerting and eerily familiar, it’s a cosmic horror story about power, theft, love, loss, and destiny.

‘Bird Deity is a spare and moving story about the burden of history and the vicissitudes of the colonial project. Morrissey’s novel has a dignified, undeniable power. It’s like Coetzee in space. I devoured it.’ –Dominic Amerena, author of I Want Everything

John Morrissey is a multi-award-winning Melbourne writer of Kalkadoon descent. His work has been published in Overland, Voiceworks, Meanjin and the anthology This All Come Back Now. He was the winner of the 2020 Boundless Mentorship, the runner-up for the 2018 Nakata Brophy Prize and named one of the Sydney Morning Herald’s Best Young Novelists of 2024. His debut short story collection, Firelight, was published in 2023 and won Best Collection in the Aurealis Awards 2023 as well as the Steele Rudd Award for a Short Story Collection in the 2024 Queensland Literary Awards.

LUCKY THING de Tom Baragwanath

In this follow-up to his award-winning debut novel Paper Cage, Tom Baragwanath delivers another bone-deep exploration of life in the margins of small-town New Zealand. LUCKY THING is a thrilling new instalment in the Lorraine Henry series.

LUCKY THING
by Tom Baragwanath
Text Publishing, September 2025

When brilliant young student Jessica Mowbrie is found beaten nearly to death in a remote patch of New Zealand bush, nobody has a clue what happened— or how to begin piecing it together. Except long-serving police records clerk Lorraine Henry.

Lorraine knows the Mowbries, like she knows everyone in her part of Masterton, and soon she’ll know a lot more. Because as something of an institution at Masterton police station, Lorraine is a woman people don’t expect much from. But sometimes, that’s an advantage. When her colleagues are busy stomping around making threats and accusations, Lorraine is listening and observing, quietly piecing together a different understanding of what happened to Jessica—an understanding that threatens everything she thought she knew about her community, her friends, and even her own family.

To get to the bottom of things, Lorraine must navigate fractured neighbourhood allegiances, and unearth all kinds of long-buried secrets—secrets that could provoke a danger hiding in plain sight and threaten those she loves the most.

In this follow-up to his award-winning debut novel Paper Cage, Tom Baragwanath delivers another bone-deep exploration of life in the margins of small-town New Zealand. Lucky Thing is a thrilling new instalment in the Lorraine Henry series.

Praise for Tom Baragwanath and Paper Cage:

‘Just the kind of dark, disturbing, gritty, and unusual treat thriller lovers are looking for.’ ―Kirkus [starred review]

‘Magnetic…This beautifully constructed plot has already won awards, and it is easy to see why with a protagonist who is impossible not to root for…Breathtakingly compelling.’ ―Daily Mail

Tom Baragwanath is originally from Masterton, New Zealand, and now lives in Paris. His debut novel, Paper Cage, published in 2022, introduced the world to records clerk Lorraine Henry. It was the winner of the 2021 Michael Gifkins Prize, shortlisted for Best International Crime Fiction in the 2023 Ned Kelly Awards and shortlisted for Best First Novel in the 2023 Ngaio Marsh Awards.

A BRIEF HISTORY OF CLIMATE FOLLY de Tim & Emma Flannery

This book reveals an outrageous history of dreamers and schemers who wanted to bend the climate to their will.

A BRIEF HISTORY OF CLIMATE FOLLY
by Tim and Emma Flannery
Text Publishing Australia, August 2026

In this entertaining and at times terrifying book, Tim and Emma Flannery tell the story of how human beings have tried to change the weather. It’s a long story that goes back to priests and shamans who prayed to weather gods and sang and danced to make it rain. It’s a story of shysters and charlatans and snake-oil salesmen. And it’s a story of shocking schemes to reshape nature.

Climate shapes species and plays a key role in evolution. But we are the only species that has ever dreamed of making the weather suit ourselves. And now that we are in danger of triggering catastrophic global warming, the history of human climate folly is more alarming than ever. Hitler, for instance, wanted to drain the Mediterranean. In the 1950s Soviet and US governments contemplated nuking the Arctic ice cap in order to create a warmer climate.

These schemes seem ludicrous to us, but are they any stranger than the idea that we can arrest runaway climate change by burying our carbon emissions deep in the earth or by seeding clouds with sulphur to block out the sun?

Tim Flannery is a paleontologist, an explorer, a conservationist and a leading writer on climate change. His books include the award-winning international bestseller The Weather Makers, and Here on Earth, Atmosphere of Hope and Europe: The First 100 Million Years, as well as his previous collaboration with his daughter, Emma Flannery, Big Meg.

Emma Flannery is a scientist and writer. She has explored caves, forests and oceans across most of the globe’s continents in search of elusive fossils, animals and plants. Her research and writing on geology, chemistry and palaeontology has been published in scientific journals, children’s books and a number of museum-based adult education tours.

DO WE DESERVE THIS? d’Eleanor Elliott Thomas

A mordantly funny family drama exploring questions of luck, misfortune and privilege. Do any of us get what we deserve?

DO WE DESERVE THIS?
by Eleanor Elliott Thomas
Text Publishing, October 2025

Credit: Karin Locke 2023

When Nina Halloway is left unconscious after a car accident, her three adult children— histrionic pop star Jeremy, uptight lawyer Genevieve, and hapless twenty-something Bean— think it’s the most dramatic thing that will happen to them all year. Then they discover that the lottery ticket Bean bought her mother just before the accident is worth money—a lot of money .

At first, the three of them agree that holding on to the ticket until Nina wakes up is the right thing to do. Then, as various financial problems arise for Jeremy and Genevieve, their resolution is tested. Bean, meanwhile, begins an ambiguous relationship with a colleague whose motivations are unclear: does he know about the lottery win? When she finds out that her mother’s estranged family has made their money in some problematic ways, she begins to doubt whether the Halloways deserve their good fortune at all.

This smart and snarky novel explores big themes and complicated relationships with a light touch, and will appeal to readers of The Rachel Incident, The Long Island Compromise and Such a Fun Age.

Eleanor Elliott Thomas worked for many years as a lawyer before devoting herself to writing full time. She lives in Melbourne with her partner and two daughters. Her debut, The Opposite of Success, was published in 2023 and was shortlisted for the 2024 Readings Prize for New Australian Fiction. Her hilarious substack can be read at: https://substack.com/@eleanorelliottthomas

THE BEST WITCH IN PARIS de Lauren Crozier

The 2023 Text Prize winner is a magical middle-grade adventure featuring an array of enchanting characters, exotic settings, a deliciously sinister antihero and an intriguing mystery to be solved. For fans of The Grandest Bookshop in the World, The Lost Library and the Nevermoor series, this sparkling adventure set in both Paris and Melbourne will captivate young readers.

THE BEST WITCH IN PARIS
by Lauren Crozier
Text Publishing, September 2024

Luna rides a battered old broom that keeps crashing itself into the school pond. She has a witch’s hat and wand and sometimes she’s quite good at magic, but she isn’t completely sure that she’s a real witch. She doesn’t have a familiar for one thing, and she doesn’t know where she came from-only that she was found by three witches who she now calls her aunts. When she swaps her moonstone ring for an Australian boobook owl in the Lost Forest, the mysterious bird seller makes her promise to keep the bird hidden for as long as she can. This is not easy when you live with very inquisitive aunts. And it’s not easy when you find out that the fearsome Madame Valadon, the Best Witch in Paris, is missing her boobook owl and she’s sure that Luna knows something about it.

Could it be that Luna has Madame Valadon’s boobook? Why then did the mysterious bird seller give it to Luna? Why did she say the bird belonged to her? A familiar can only belong to one witch, after all. Luna has lots of questions-the biggest one of all is who she really is.

Fun and funny and full of life, The Best Witch in Paris is a delightful story of courage and self-belief, with colourful characters, fabulous magic and a puzzling mystery at its core.

Lauren Crozier won the 2023 Text Prize for her debut novel THE BEST WITCH IN PARIS. She lives in Sydney with her partner and their two children.