Scribe Publications: 214 books

A tour de force about the impact of war on one family over the twentieth century. Working at the Australian War Memorial for many years, Michael McKernan had heard and written about many stories of war. For him, war was never about the big picture; it always came down to the individual. Yet...

WINNER OF THE 2017 VICTORIAN PREMIER'S LITERARY AWARD FOR FICTION WINNER OF THE 2016 UNIVERSITY OF QUEENSLAND FICTION BOOK AWARD SHORTLISTED FOR THE 2017 STELLA PRIZE Outside, the rain continues unceasing; silver sheets sluicing down, the trees and shrubs soaking and bedraggled,...

We are now living in a world where Brexit and Trump are daily realities. But how did this come about? And what does it mean for the future? Populism and ultra-nationalism brought about the rise of Hitler and Mussolini in the 1930s. Now, as Trump sits in the White House, Britain negotiates its...

‘Do you ever think about those you left behind?’, I ask father. ‘Not often’, he says. ‘Such memories are a luxury I can’t afford.’ First his parents made a journey to the New World. It was the 1930s, and Europe was seething. As he grew up, Arnold Zable heard tales, songs,...

Ramona Koval has been praised as a master of the interview genre, renowned for engaging writers in conversations that are incisive, provocative, and often funny. In this new collection, Speaking Volumes: conversations with remarkable writers, she shares the most fascinating interviews from...

In 1933, a ten-year-old Jewish girl, Fela Perelman, befriended a new family that had moved into her street in Lodz, Poland. There were three children in the Rozenblum family — Rose, Felix, and Maria. Fela and Rose became best friends, while Felix kept his distance. Five years later, Fela and Felix...

WINNER OF THE VICTORIAN PREMIER'S LITERARY AWARDS C.J. DENNIS PRIZE FOR POETRY SHORTLISTED FOR THE 2011 WESTERN AUSTRALIAN PREMIER'S BOOK AWARDS Disarming, warm, and always accessible, Cate Kennedy’s poems make ordinary experiences glow. Everything that suffuses her well-loved prose...

A beautiful celebratory tribute to the powers of one of our most undervalued skills — an ideal gift for the avid reader. ‘What you are doing right now is, cosmically speaking, against the odds.’ As young children, we are taught to read, but soon go on to forget just how miraculous...

SHORTLISTED FOR THE AHRC'S ANNUAL HUMAN RIGHTS MEDALS AND AWARDS The first decade of the twenty-first century has seen a sharp decline in respect for human rights and the international rule of law. The legal conventions of the new realpolitik seem to owe more to Guantanamo than Geneva. Australia...

LONGLISTED FOR THE 2017 AUSTRALIAN BOOK INDUSTRY AWARDS, BIOGRAPHY BOOK OF THE YEAR Paul Keating: the big-picture leader is the definitive biography of Australia’s 24th prime minister, and the first that Keating has cooperated with in more than two decades. Drawing on around 15 hours...

Did the dead exist? Were they watching? Were they ghosts? Not the kind he’d imagined as a child, draped with white sheets, with the ability to walk through walls, but the kind that lodged themselves in your heart, in your memories, the kind that came to you in dreams, that you could see when you...

Most histories of Australia’s Great War rush their readers into the trenches. This history is very different. For the first time, it examines events closely, even hour-by-hour, in both Britain and Australia during the last days of peace in July–August 1914. London’s choice for war was...

WINNER OF THE 2016 BARBARA JEFFERIS AWARD SHORTLISTED FOR THE 2016 STELLA PRIZE SHORTLISTED FOR THE 2016 MILES FRANKLIN AWARD 'They were inescapable, the tensions of the adult world — the fraught and febrile aura that surrounded Ishtar and those in her orbit, that whined and...

‘When put to the test, most people have difficulty identifying what justice is, especially when there is tension between proper process and a desired result. Due process is inherent in our conception of justice. But bad process can yield the right result, just as good process can produce the wrong...