In June this year, Emeritus Professor Barbara Santich delivered a fascinating talk to the South Australian Garden History Society. Barbara has been kind enough to let us republish her fascinating talk on little-known Jean-Louis Edouard Bourbaud.

A little-known figure, Bourbaud was a French wine expert who came to SA in the mid-19th Century, and who also encouraged mulberry growing for silk production. Barbara’s research on Bourbaud is part of a wider research project for the Institute for the Study of French-Australian Relations (ISFAR), although the project is still in its early stages.

Find out more about his fascinating story below!

Continue reading →

Roger Zubrinich and Judy Peters like to travel. A lot. And primarily, but not exclusively, to Europe. The attraction of Europe, apart from its more or less limitless offerings, is that they are able to drive their way around. Every European summer from 1994 to 2019 after which the pandemic halted travel, they’ve picked up a lease car, most often in Paris but not always, and have driven to places large and small across Europe and the UK. Roger drives, Judy navigates, and yes, they’re still together.

Sometimes the excursions have been as short as four weeks, other times as long as 12 weeks. They have driven as far north as Lulea in Sweden, which is about 110 kilometres below the Arctic Circle, and as far east as the Black Sea in Romania and Bulgaria. In fact, they’ve driven through most countries in Europe, some numerous times, with the exceptions being countries such as the Ukraine that are excluded by the lease car insurance. Given that they can’t travel at present, Roger has decided to revisit some of their destinations in writing. He has no doubt that driving to them is infinitely easier.

Continue reading →

Every thriving reading community needs good bookshops, and good booksellers. In our Meet the Bookseller series, we introduce you to some of Australia’s most loved booksellers, starting with our local community of Adelaide. If you’d like to nominate a bookshop or bookseller to be featured, please let us know in comments, or email maddy@wakefieldpress.com.au.

This week, meet Annie Waters, manager at Mostly Books in Mitcham. Read on to find out what the last book she read and loved was, and what makes Mostly Books different from other bookshops.

Continue reading →

Every thriving reading community needs good bookshops, and good booksellers. In our Meet the Bookseller series, we introduce you to some of Australia’s most loved booksellers, starting with our local community of Adelaide. If you’d like to nominate a bookshop or bookseller to be featured, please let us know in comments, or email maddy@wakefieldpress.com.au.

This week, we have Molly Murn, a long-time bookseller at Matilda Bookshop in the spectacular Adelaide Hills town of Stirling. Read on to find out what she loves about being a bookseller, and how she first got into the business of books.

Continue reading →

In this new author interview series, we’re getting to know our authors a little better by throwing a few quick questions at them. First up to the plate is Catherine Bishop, author of Too Much Cabbage and Jesus Christ: Australia’s ‘Mission Girl’ Annie Lock.

Catherine takes us through what she’s currently reading, the books she wishes she wrote, and the best piece of advice she’s been given as an author.

Continue reading →

If you’ve been following the blog for a while, you might remember that we’ve been busily working on Hometown Haunts: #LoveOzYA horror stories since October last year (how the time flies!).

We’re so pleased to announce today that the collection will be published on October 31! We’re even more excited to be able to reveal the stunning cover, designed by Liz Nicholson with the illustration by Adelaide TAFE Arts student Jessie Oates.

Read on to see the stunning cover in full, and to get a first taste of what to expect.

Continue reading →

Every thriving reading community needs good bookshops, and good booksellers. In our Meet the Bookseller series, we introduce you to some of Australia’s most loved booksellers, starting with our own local community of Adelaide. If you’d like to nominate a bookshop or bookseller to be featured, please let us know in comments, or email maddy@wakefieldpress.com.au.

Next up is Jason Lake, veteran bookseller and co-owner of the iconic Imprints Booksellers on Hindley Street. Read on to find out what he loves about being a bookseller, and how he first got into the business of books.

Continue reading →

Every thriving reading community needs good bookshops, and good booksellers. In this new series, we introduce you to some of Australia’s most loved booksellers, starting with our own local community of Adelaide. If you’d like to nominate a bookshop or bookseller to be featured, please let us know in comments, or email maddy@wakefieldpress.com.au.

First up, meet an Adelaide bookselling icon: Graham, the reigning book detective behind the Dymocks Adelaide special orders counter. Read on to find out what he’s reading, and what makes his bookshop different from others.

Continue reading →

Wakefield Press is delighted to announce the acquisition of world rights to Roz Bellamy’s Mood, a memoir exploring the intersections of mental illness, queerness, gender diversity and Jewish identity.

Bellamy is the online editor at Archer magazine and has just completed the prestigious US literary publisher Tin House’s Summer Workshop, working on the manuscript for Mood.

Last year, Mood was longlisted for the Kill Your Darlings Unpublished Manuscript Award. An earlier version was shortlisted for the Scribe Nonfiction Prize. 

Read on to discover more about this exciting new acquisition, and to hear Roz’s thoughts on joining the Wakefield Press team.

Continue reading →

Stephen Orr has always been a supporter of the arts in Australia. His award-winning Time’s Long Ruin was adapted into Innocence, an Australian opera, in 2013. In this special guest piece for the blog, Stephen laments the fate of Australian stories, and how we’re losing the battle to keep home-grown culture alive.

Read on for his thoughts on the arts in Australia.

Continue reading →