Fiction Longlist Announced for the 2018 Indie Book Awards!

Australian independent booksellers, members of Leading Edge Books, are thrilled to announce their Fiction Longlist for the Indie Book Awards 2018! 2018 marks ten years of the Indie Book Awards, celebrating indie booksellers as champions of Australian authors. It’s the best of the best in Australian publishing; previous winners include The Dry by Jane Harper,  The Narrow Road to the Deep North by Richard Flanagan, and The Light Between Oceans by M.L. Stedman.

Have any of these made YOUR longlist?

A Long Way from Home by Peter Carey: Well known as Australia’s master novelist, Peter Carey returns to Australia in his latest novel. Set in the 1950s, Peter Carey tackles what it means to be Australian, our European history, and the Indigenous owners of the land.

The Life to Come by Michelle de Kretser: From Miles Franklin Literary Award winner, The Life to Come is a mesmerising novel about the stories we tell and don’t tell ourselves as individuals, as societies and as nations, set in Sydney, Paris, and Sri Lanka.

First Person by Richard Flanagan: Ghostwriters, Tasmania, and family history – the newest Richard Flanagan delves into crime, lies, and literature, following ghostwriter Kif Kehlmann when he is asked to work on a project of dubious legality.

Force of Nature by Jane Harper: Who didn’t love The Dry? Jane Harper is on the longlist again with yet another haunting mystery. Five women pick up their backpacks for a hike through the Giralang Ranges – but only one makes it out the other side…

The Choke by Sofie Laguna: Haunting, confronting and powerful, The Choke is a brilliant, haunting novel about a child navigating an often dark and uncaring world of male power and violence, in which grown-ups can’t be trusted and comfort can only be found in nature.

The Passage of Love by Alex Miller: From far north Queensland to Melbourne, The Passage of Love is a rich blend of thoughtful and beautifully observed writing, the lives of a husband and wife are laid bare in their passionate struggle to engage with their individual creativity.

The Secrets She Keeps by Michael Robotham: A Better Reading favourite, The Secrets She Keeps is a compelling psychological thriller that delves deeply into the psyche of the human mind, by internationally bestselling author Michael Robotham.

Taboo by Kim Scott: From two-times winner of the Miles Franklin Literary Award, comes a work charged with ambition and poetry, in equal parts brutal, mysterious and idealistic, about a young woman cast into a drama that has been playing for over two hundred years …

On the Java Ridge by Jock Serong: Jock Serong, bestselling author of The Rules of Backyard Cricket, brings us a literary novel with the pace and tension of a political thriller – and some of the most compelling, heartstopping writing about the sea since Patrick O’Brian.

City of Crows by Chris Womersley: An extraordinary historical novel set in seventeenth century France: desperate to save herself and her only surviving child from an outbreak of plague, the widow Charlotte Picot flees her village to seek sanctuary in Lyon.