‘Some essays in this collection plunged me into thought. Some caused me to weep. Some brought tears of laughter. Some essays won me over by the power of their imagination. Some by their analytic clarity. Some by their excruciating honesty. Some by the pain of things past or present faced without flinching.’ – Robert Manne In The Best Australian Essays 2014, Robert Manne assembles his picks of contemporary non-fiction writing. Tim Winton reflects on the impact of landscape on the Australian character; Helen Garner remembers her mother with a raw and stirring poignancy; Christos Tsiolkas wonders how the Left forgot their origins; Tim Flannery traces the history of the Great Barrier Reef and fears its destruction. With essays traversing madness, liberty under the rule of Tony Abbott, the enslaving of horses and the legacy of Doris Lessing, this sharp collection offers lucid insight, shrewd understanding and heartbreaking empathy. Moreno Giovannoni • Rozanna Lilley • Caroline Baum • Guy Rundle • Peter Conrad • Jessie Cole • Karen Hitchcock • Antonia Hayes • Luke Ryan • Helen Garner • Sybille Smith • Christian Ryan • Dennis Glover • Don Watson • Rachel Nolan • David Marr • J.M. Coetzee • Nicolas Rothwell • David Malouf • Clive James • Carrie Tiffany • Robyn Davidson • Neil Murray • Noel Pearson • Christos Tsiolkas • Luke Mogelson • Tim Flannery • Tim Winton

'Some essays in this collection plunged me into thought. Some caused me to weep. Some brought tears of laughter. Some essays won me over by the power of their imagination. Some by their analytic clarity. Some by their excruciating honesty. Some by the pain of things past or present faced without flinching.' - Robert Manne In The Best Australian Essays 2014, Robert Manne assembles his picks of contemporary non-fiction writing. Tim Winton reflects on the impact of landscape on the Australian character; Helen Garner remembers her mother with a raw and stirring poignancy; Christos Tsiolkas wonders how the Left forgot their origins; Tim Flannery traces the history of the Great Barrier Reef and fears its destruction. With essays traversing madness, liberty under the rule of Tony Abbott, the enslaving of horses and the legacy of Doris Lessing, this sharp collection offers lucid insight, shrewd understanding and heartbreaking empathy. Moreno Giovannoni âe¢ Rozanna Lilley âe¢ Caroline Baum âe¢ Guy Rundle âe¢ Peter Conrad âe¢ Jessie Cole âe¢ Karen Hitchcock âe¢ Antonia Hayes âe¢ Luke Ryan âe¢ Helen Garner âe¢ Sybille Smith âe¢ Christian Ryan âe¢ Dennis Glover âe¢ Don Watson âe¢ Rachel Nolan âe¢ David Marr âe¢ J.M. Coetzee âe¢ Nicolas Rothwell âe¢ David Malouf âe¢ Clive James âe¢ Carrie Tiffany âe¢ Robyn Davidson âe¢ Neil Murray âe¢ Noel Pearson âe¢ Christos Tsiolkas âe¢ Luke Mogelson âe¢ Tim Flannery âe¢ Tim Winton

‘The essay creates a place for slow thought on hectic subjects, and that is what the best of this year’s crop manage to do.’ —Geordie Williamson In The Best Australian Essays 2016, Geordie Williamson curates the year’s best non-fiction writing from Australia’s finest writers. The result is a collection that reads as a wake-up call: from Jo Chandler on the devastating bleaching of the Great Barrier Reef and Richard Flanagan on the Syrian exodus to Kurdish-Iranian journalist Behrouz Boochani’s inside account of life on Manus Island. There is also space for Bowie, TV box-sets and Aussie rules. Spanning politics, music, literature, art, ecology, linguistics and more, this anthology showcases the nation’s most eloquent and insightful writing. Contributors include Maggie Mackellar, Ashley Hay, Rebecca Giggs, Anwen Crawford, Melinda Harvey, Mireille Juchau, Fiona Wright, Vicki Hastrich, Helen Garner, Tegan Bennett Daylight, Jennifer Mills, Fiona McGregor, Michelle de Kretser, Jo Chandler, Anna Spargo-Ryan, Peter Goldsworthy, Gregory Day, J.M. Coetzee, James Bradley, Galarrwuy Yunupingu, Richard Flanagan, Adam Rivett, Michael Winkler, Behrouz Boochani, Martin McKenzie-Murray, Guy Rundle, Clive James, Julian Burnside and Kim Scott.

Setting the benchmark for the Australian essay the definitive, up-to-date collection. Each year, The Best Australian Essays brings together the most outstanding non-fiction from around the country. In 2011, to celebrate a rich decade of writing on all manner of topics, Black Inc.

‘The art of the story is mostly about the journey, and the economy of means with which the writers here carry us a great distance is at times breathtaking.’ – Amanda Lohrey In The Best Australian Stories 2014, Patrick White Award–winning author Amanda Lohrey selects the outstanding short fiction of the year. Sometimes fantastical, sometimes raw, and always a ‘shot of adrenaline to the mind and heart’, this collection features exciting new voices alongside the established and admired. The edges of reality blur in a corporate lawyer’s tale of working in a 1200-storey glass tower. A prized coffee table becomes the focus of a father’s anxieties and frustrations. Tense and fractured lines of communication shape the life of an interpreter on Christmas Island. Imaginative, remarkable, intimate – this unmissable anthology celebrates the art of consummate storytelling. Julienne Van Loon • Shaun Prescott • Lucy Neave • Anthony Panegyres • Nicola Redhouse • Edwina Shaw • Claire Corbett • Fiona Place • Kate Elkington • Arabella Edge • Claire Aman • Angela Meyer • J.Y.L. Koh • Rebekah Clarkson • Ryan O'Neill • Mark Smith • Anna Krien • David Brooks • Leah Swann • Kirsten Tranter • Lisa Jacobson • Melanie Joosten

Wonky, idiosyncratic, fragmentary, paradoxical, drunk on words, the essay has . . . a uniquely human thumbprint.—Geordie Williamson In The Best Australian Essays 2015, Geordie Williamson compiles the year’s outstanding short non-fiction. Read Helen Garner on condescension, DBC Pierre on travel, Ceridwen Dovey on autobiography, Tim Winton on injury, Anna Krien on first love, and Nicolas Rothwell on the northern coast. With bracing essays on politics, music, literature, history, art, sport and more, this impressive anthology will entrance, stimulate and entertain. Sebastian Smee • Anwen Crawford • Maria Tumarkin • Tim Flannery • Nadia Wheatley • James Bradley • Tim Winton • Gerard Elson • Rebecca Giggs • Alison Croggon • Mungo MacCallum • Sophie Cunningham • Jeff Sparrow • Nicolas Rothwell • Karen Hitchcock • Tegan Bennett Daylight • Drusilla Modjeska • Noel Pearson • Delia Falconer • Kirsten Tranter • Stephen Romei • Helen Garner • Anna Krien • Guy Rundle • Ceridwen Dovey • Matthew Lamb • Ashley Hay • Christian Ryan • David Walsh • Mark Mordue • Felicity Plunkett • DBC Pierre

The best of the best This essential book takes a decade of Best Australian Essays and selects the cream of the crop. These are the pieces that have captured key events - from September 11 to Victoria's fires - changed the way we see the nation, for good or ill - from Anzac Day to Palm Island - investigated intriguing figures - from Oskar Schindler to Charles Darwin - or which simply represent a peak of the writer's art. Contributors include: Thomas Keneally, Chloe Hooper, Peter Porter, David Malouf, John Birmingham, Helen Garner, Inga Clendinnen, MJ Hyland, Barry Humphries, David Marr, Clive James, Robyn Davidson, Christos Tsiolkas, Craig Sherborne, Kevin Brophy, Frank Devine, Barry Oakley, Jessica Anderson, Alan Frost, Gary Hughes, Christine Kenneally, JM Coetzee, Simon Leys, Anna Goldsworthy, Brenda Walker, Anne Manne, Shane Maloney, Noel Pearson, Tim Flannery, Robert Manne, Richard Flanagan, Gay Alcorn, Mark Riley, Nicolas Rothwell, Robert Dessaix, Anna Krien, Tim Winton, Kate Jennings, Benjamin Law and David Foster