# 2023 in Australian literature

This is a list of historical events and publications of Australian literature during 2023.

## Events

* July: Publisher Hachette Australia withdraws from publication the book titled Special Operations Group by Christophe Glasl after Victoria Police expressed concerns about the accuracy of the book
* December: Yumna Kassab is announced as inaugural Parramatta Laureate of Literature for 2024

## Major publications
### Literary fiction

* Hossein Asgari – Only Sound Remains
* Tony Birch – Women & Children
* Jen Craig – Wall
* Lauren Aimee Curtis – Strangers in the Port
* Trent Dalton – Lola in the Mirror
* André Dao – Anam
* Gregory Day – The Bell of the World
* Ali Cobby Eckermann – She Is the Earth (verse novel)
* Lexi Freiman – The Book of Ayn
* Madeleine Gray – Green Dot
* Kate Grenville – Restless Dolly Maunder
* John Kinsella – Cellnight: A verse novel
* Melissa Lucashenko – Edenglassie
* Kate Morton – Homecoming
* Angela O'Keeffe – The Sitter
* Mirandi Riwoe – Sunbirds
* Sanya Rushdi – Hospital
* Tracy Sorensen – The Vitals
* Christos Tsiolkas – The In-Between
* Pip Williams – The Bookbinder of Jericho
* Charlotte Wood – Stone Yard Devotional
* Alexis Wright – Praiseworthy

### Children's and Young Adult fiction

* Melissa Kang & Yumi Stynes – Welcome to Sex, illustrated by Jenny Latham
* Will Kostakis – We Could Be Something
* Alice Pung – Millie Mak the Maker, illustrated by Sher Rill Ng
* Lili Wilkinson – A Hunger of Thorns
* Dianne Wolfer – Scout and the Rescue Dogs

### Short story collections

* J. M. Coetzee – The Pole and Other Stories
* Laura Jean McKay – Gunflower
* Graeme Simsion – Creative Differences: And Other Stories

### Crime and mystery

* Tim Ayliffe – Killer Traitor Spy
* Ashley Kalagian Blunt – Dark Mode
* Shelley Burr – Ripper
* Candice Fox – Fire With Fire
* Megan Goldin – Dark Corners
* Chris Hammer – The Seven
* Amanda Hampson – The Tea Ladies
* Sally Hepworth – Darling Girls
* Fiona McIntosh – Dead Tide
* Benjamin Stevenson – Everyone on this train is a suspect
* Chris Womersley – Ordinary Gods and Monsters

### Science fiction and fantasy

* Greg Egan
** "Didicosm"
** Scale
* Shelley Parker-Chan – He Who Drowned the World

### Poetry

* Stuart Barnes – Like to the Lark
* Dan Hogan – Secret Third Thing
* John Kinsella – Harsh Hakea: Collected Poems Volume Two (2005–2014)
* David McCooey – The Book of Falling
* Jennifer Maiden – Golden Bridge: New Poems
* Pi O – The Tour
* Tais Rose Wae – Riverbed Sky Songs
* Grace Yee – Chinese Fish

### Non-Fiction

* Chanel Contos – Consent Laid Bare
* Robyn Davidson – Unfinished Woman
* Marele Day – Reckless
* Martin Flanagan – The Empty Honour Board
* Clementine Ford – I Don't
* Anna Funder – Wifedom: Mrs Orwell's Invisible Life
* Michael Gawenda – My Life as a Jew
* Stan Grant – The Queen is Dead: The Time has Come for a Reckoning
* Susan Johnson – Aphrodite's Breath
* Christine Kenneally – Ghosts of the Orphanage
* Sarah Krasnostein – On Peter Carey
* David Marr – Killing for Country: A Family Story
* Ross McMullin – Life So Full of Promise
* Alex Miller – A Kind of Confession: The Writer's Private World
* Matt Preston – Big Mouth
* Alecia Simmonds – Courting: An Intimate History of Love and the Law
* Margaret Simons – Tanya Plibersek: On Her Own Terms
* Christine Wallace – Political Lives: Australian Prime Ministers and Their Biographers

### Drama

* Nicholas Brown – Sex Magick
* Joanna Murray-Smith – Julia

## Awards and honours

Note: these awards were presented in the year in question.

### Lifetime achievement

| Award | Author |
| Patrick White Award | Alex Skovron |

### Literary

| Award | Author | Title | Publisher |
| ALS Gold Medal | Debra Dank | We Come With This Place | Echo Publishing |
| Colin Roderick Award | Sarah Holland-Batt | The Jaguar | University of Queensland Press |
| Indie Book Awards Book of the Year | Craig Silvey | Runt | Allen & Unwin |
| New South Wales Premier's Literary Awards | Debra Dank | We Come With This Place | Echo Publishing |
| Stella Prize | Sarah Holland-Batt | The Jaguar | University of Queensland Press |
| Victorian Premier's Literary Awards | Jessica Au | Cold Enough for Snow | Giramondo Publishing |

### Fiction

| Award | Author | Title | Publisher |
| Adelaide Festival Awards for Literature | Not awarded | | |
| The Age Book of the Year | Robbie Arnott | Limberlost | Text Publishing |
| ARA Historical Novel Prize | Gail Jones | Salonika Burning | Text Publishing |
| The Australian/Vogel Literary Award | Anna McGahan | Immaculate | Allen & Unwin |
| Barbara Jefferis Award | Not awarded | | |
| Indie Book Awards Book of the Year – Fiction | Geraldine Brooks | Horse | Viking Books |
| Indie Book Awards Book of the Year – Debut Fiction | Tracey Lien | All That's Left Unsaid | HQ Fiction |
| Miles Franklin Award | Shankari Chandran | Chai Time at Cinnamon Gardens | Ultimo Press |
| Prime Minister's Literary Awards | Jessica Au | Cold Enough for Snow | Giramondo |
| New South Wales Premier's Literary Awards | Katerina GIbson | Women I Know | Scribner |
| Queensland Literary Awards | Alexis Wright | Praiseworthy | Giramondo |
| Victorian Premier's Literary Awards | Jessica Au | Cold Enough for Snow | Giramondo |

### Children and Young Adult

| Award | Category | Author | Title | Publisher |
| ARA Historical Novel Prize | Children and Young Adult | Amelia Mellor | The Bookseller’s Apprentice | Affirm Press |
| Children's Book of the Year Award | Older Readers | Tom Taylor | Neverlanders | Penguin Random House |
| Children's Book of the Year Award | Younger Readers | Craig Silvey | Runt | Allen & Unwin |
| Children's Book of the Year Award | Picture Book | Zeno Sworder | My Strange Shrinking Parents | Thames & Hudson |
| Children's Book of the Year Award | Early Childhood | Vikki Conley, illus. Max Hamilton | Where the Lyrebird Lives | Windy Hollow |
| Children's Book of the Year Award | Eve Pownall Award for Information Books | Jess McGeachin | DEEP: Delve into hidden words | Welbeck Publishing |
| Indie Book Awards Book of the Year | Children's | Craig Silvey | Runt | Allen & Unwin |
| Indie Book Awards Book of the Year | Young Adult | Holden Shepherd | The Brink | Text Publishing |
| Prime Minister's Literary Awards | Children's | Jasmine Seymour | Open Your Heart to Country | Magabala Books |
| Prime Minister's Literary Awards | Young Adult | Sarah Winifred Searle | The Greatest Thing | Allen & Unwin |
| New South Wales Premier's Literary Awards | Children's | Corey Tutt and Blak Douglas | The First Scientists | Hardie Grant |
| New South Wales Premier's Literary Awards | Young People's | Lystra Rose | The Upwelling | Hachette |
| Queensland Literary Awards | Children's | Katrina Nannestad | Waiting for the Storks | ABC Books |
| Queensland Literary Awards | Young Adult | Biffy James | Completely Normal (and Other Lies) | Hardie Grant |
| Victorian Premier's Literary Awards | Young Adult Fiction | Kate Murray | We Who Hunt the Hollow | Hardie Grant |

### Crime and Mystery
#### National

| Award | Category | Author | Title | Publisher |
| Davitt Award | Novel | Tracey Lien | All That’s Left Unsaid | HQ Fiction |
| Davitt Award | Young adult novel | Fleur Ferris | Seven Days | Puffin |
| Davitt Award | Children's novel | Charlie Archbold | The Sugarcane Kids and the Red-Bottomed Boat | Text Publishing |
| Davitt Award | Non-fiction | Megan Norris | Out of the Ashes | Simon and Schuster Australia |
| Davitt Award | Debut | Hayley Scrivenor | Dirt Town | Pan Macmillan |
| Davitt Award | Readers' choice | Vikki Petraitis | The Unbelieved | Allen & Unwin |
| Ned Kelly Award | Novel | Jane Harper | Exiles | Pan Macmillan |
| Ned Kelly Award | First novel | Shelley Burr | Wake | Hachette Australia |
| Ned Kelly Award | True crime | Sandi Logan | Betrayed | Hachette Australia |

### Poetry

| Award | Author | Title | Publisher |
| Adelaide Festival Awards for Literature | Not awarded | | |
| Anne Elder Award(joint winners) | Harry Reid | Leave Me Alone | Cordite |
| Anne Elder Award(joint winners) | Theodore Ell | Beginning In Sight | RWP |
| Mary Gilmore Award | Harry Reid | Leave Me Alone | Cordite |
| Prime Minister's Literary Awards | Gavin Yuan Gao | At the Altar of Touch | UQP |
| New South Wales Premier's Literary Awards | Kim Cheng Boey | The Singer and Other Poems | Cordite |
| Judith Wright Calanthe Award for a Poetry Collection | Lionel Fogarty | Harvest Lingo | Giramondo |
| Victorian Premier's Literary Awards | Gavin Yuan Gao | At the Altar of Touch | UQP |

### Drama

| Award | Category | Author | Title | Publisher |
| New South Wales Premier's Literary Awards | Script | Del Kathryn Barton and Huna Amweero | Blaze | Causeway Films |
| New South Wales Premier's Literary Awards | Play | Dylan Van Den Berg | Whitefella Yella Tree | Griffin Theatre Company & Currency Press |
| Victorian Premier's Literary Awards | | John Harvey | The Return | Malthouse Theatre |

### Non-Fiction

| Award | Category | Author | Title | Publisher |
| Adelaide Festival Awards for Literature | Non-Fiction | Not awarded | |
| The Age Book of the Year | Non-Fiction | Kim Mahood | Wandering With Intent | Scribe |
| Indie Book Awards Book of the Year | Non-Fiction | Richard Fidler | The Book of Roads And Kingdoms | ABC Books |
| Indie Book Awards Book of the Year | Illustrated Non-Fiction | Damien Coulthard and Rebecca Sullivan | First Nations Food Companion | Murdoch Books |
| National Biography Award | Biography | Ann-Marie Priest | My Tongue Is My Own: A Life of Gwen Harwood | La Trobe University Press / Black Inc. |
| Prime Minister's Literary Awards | Non-Fiction | Sam Vincent | My Father and Other Animals | Black Inc. |
| New South Wales Premier's Literary Awards | Non-Fiction | Debra Dank | We Come With This Place | Echo Publishing |
| New South Wales Premier's History Awards | Australian History | Alan Atkinson | Elizabeth and John: The Macarthurs of Elizabeth Farm | NewSouth |
| New South Wales Premier's History Awards | Community and Regional History | Ian Hodges | He Belonged to Wagga: The Great War, the AIF and returned soldiers in an Australian country town | ASP |
| New South Wales Premier's History Awards | General History | Michael Laffan | Under Empire: Muslim lives and loyalties across the Indian Ocean world, 1775–1945 | Columbia University |
| Queensland Literary Awards | Non-Fiction | Debra Dank | We Come with This Place | Echo Publishing |
| Victorian Premier's Literary Awards | Non-Fiction | Eda Gunaydin | Root & Branch: Essays on inheritance | NewSouth |

## Deaths

* 21 January – Gabrielle Williams, author of young adult fiction (born 1963)
* 3 February – Portia Robinson, historian (born 1926)
* 19 April – Lee Harding, novelist (born 1937)
* 21 April – John Tranter, poet, publisher and editor (born 1943)
* 22 April – Barry Humphries, comedian, author, actor and satirist (born 1934)
* 2 May – Gabrielle Carey, novelist (born 1959)
* 22 May – Andrew Burke, poet (born 1944)
* 30 June – Ron Pretty, poet (born 1940)
* 6 August – Elizabeth Webby, scholar of Australian literature (born 1942)
* 18 November – Nan Witcomb, poet and radio broadcaster (born 1927/1928)
* 21 November – Dale Spender, feminist writer (born 1943)
* 10 December – Michael Blakemore, actor, writer and theatre director (born 1928)
* 12 December – Shirley Barber, children's author and illustrator (born 1935 in the Channel Islands)
* 30 December – John Pilger, journalist and filmmaker (born 1939) (died in the United Kingdom)