Rhyme & Reason

A study of Independent Publishers in Australian SF

Jennifer Lusk

[Editor's note: this piece was written in December 2006]

First Impressions

A number of Australians have debuted on fantasy shelves in major bookshops around the country over the last ten years. Sara Douglass was the first to draw serious attention in the mid-nineties with her BattleAxe trilogy, the second two books winning the 1997 Aurealis Award for excellence in the category of full length fantasy. Since her success, a number of other Australians, mostly female, have added their epic trilogy fantasy to the mix, published primarily by Voyager/HarperCollins, but also by Pan McMillan and Random House. Last year, HarperCollins alone published twenty Australian speculative fiction titles[1]. While the shiny covers and large print runs have done much to seemingly aid the speculative fiction genre in this country, the very loyal ‘genuine’ speculative fiction community is not so certain.

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