This rich treasury of children’s book illustrations will transport readers of all ages back to their childhoods, with favourite characters such as Snugglepot and Cuddlepie, the Magic Pudding and Blinky Bill all featured. But Juliet O’Conor, who works in the children’s collection at the State Library of Victoria, has also included plenty of examples of less familiar works in her quest to ‘reveal the lesser known within a bigger picture’. Bottersnikes also demonstrates different stages in the development of visual signs of national identity, evident even in simple ABC books. O’Conor often leaves the pictures to tell their own story while focusing the text on history and context, making this scholarly enterprise accessible to all readers.

Hannah Rachel Bell met indigenous lawman and artist Bungal (David) Mowaljarlai on the ‘speaking circuit’ in the 1970s and the feminist activist and indigenous spokesperson went on to form an unlikely friendship. Her growing knowledge of indigenous culture also sparked a communication and friendship with West Australian literary icon Tim Winton after she recognised an indigenous way of being and seeing in his novels. Blending memoir, literary criticism, cultural analysis and travel writing, this curiously genre-bending book is an extraordinary journey into Australian storytelling (‘the way in which we make sense of the world’), and the convergence in the ‘cosmologies’ of two very different artists from different cultures on the same continent, both drawing on the same landscape.

Prose considers the artistry, ambition and enduring influence of Anne Frank’s beloved classic, The Diaryof a Young Girl.

Crime fiction writer Susan Hill embarks on a year-long reacquaintance with her book collection.

Dowrick reveals how Rilke’s transcendent poetry can help us connect with our inner life. NB: December release.

Harman traces the growth of Jane Austen’s fame and its influence on chick-lit, romantic comedy, the heritage industry and film.

Written by a team of more than 140 contributors, the Companion is the best guide to English literature available. NB: December release.

Wallace seeks an answer to the deceptively simple question ‘What is the actual, real-life value of education?’