2026 Reading Challenge: July Indigenous Authors

This July we're celebrating the stories told by Indigenous authors from around Australia. From across the spectrum of interests, experiences, genres and age groups, we've got a little bit of everything to cover this month's reading challenge. We've collated some recommendations below and you can explore more on our website!

Song of the Shadow of a Seed by Luisa Mitchell

Seeds are sacred. They are the minutiae of all life, along with Boodjar (Country), Beeliar (rivers), women, and all bodies and vessels that carry living things.

Mitchell's debut collection is divided into different cycles around the life of a seed - elders, memory, language, hunger, burning, flowering, flight - and the poems within reflect the ways in which a seed, a person and a nation can contain the long history of what has been, as well as the promise of what is to come.

These poems open conversations about connection to Country, the resilience of culture, and the complex articulation of identity as a First Nations descendant. Inventive, moving and accessible, Mitchell's work includes conversations-in-poetry with family members that weave connection and shared history into every line. They are a call to listen, to learn, and to engage with the lived truths of Whadjuk Nyungar Country.

Crybaby by Mabel Gibson

CryBaby is a collection of micro memoir which chronicles the artistic and deeply emotional growth of writer Mabel Gibson. This is the first memoir-in-flash by a First Nations writer published in Australia.

Moving across the distinct landscapes of Albany, Geraldton and Perth, these short autobiographical stories chart Mabel's life, from the age of two to twenty-four. They tell her story as a Yamatji woman who, in the consuming storms of personal challenges and grief, finds her voice and strength as a writer.

In a style that is riveting, honest and relatable, Mabel's stories address issues that affect all young people-mental health, love, loss, and accepting the unfixed nature of identity. The collection's dreamy and fragmented structure, with unvarnished layers of truth and insight, will leave you breathless and in awe of this exciting new talent in Australian writing.

I am Nannertgarrook by Tasma Walton

Based on the true story of Tasma Walton’s ancestor, a powerful, heart-wrenching novel about maternal love that endures against pitiless odds

From her idyllic life in sea country in Nerrm (Port Phillip Bay, Victoria), Nannertgarrook is abducted and taken to a slave market, leaving behind a husband, daughter and son. Pregnant when seized, she soon gives birth to another son, whom she raises with the children of her fellow captives. Nannertgarrook is separated not only from her Boonwurrung family, but from her birthright – the ceremonies she once was so joyously part of, the majestic whales who are her totem, the land and sky and sea country and its creatures.

All these things she loves as deeply as she does her blood kin. But now, as her reality becomes profoundly different, she must keep that family and her old life alive in her mind. Their rich, pulsating elements sing to us through her beautiful voice, even while Nannertgarrook herself is subjected to the worst of humanity. This sweeping novel asks us to consider who, in colonial history, were the real savages, and what it truly means to be civilised.

The Paradise Pact by Anita Heiss

Abbey's ready for a holiday. Between her growing business, her recently failed relationship and her energetic grandkids, she needs to get away. So when her best friends suggest they take their yearly girls' trip international and hit Hawai'i, Abbey says yes faster than you can say aloha.

Before Abbey, Stevie and Caitlin head to paradise, they make a pact: they will do nothing but indulge in mai tais and sunsets - oh, and run a half marathon. It'll be just what Abbey needs, and she's determined to put herself first for once. Then Abbey meets Kaleo, a man who makes her heart race, and things get complicated.

This was supposed to be a fun, drama-free holiday, but will the call of holiday romance be too much to pass by? And what happens when reality comes knocking?

Ankami by Debra Dank

From the award-winning and critically acclaimed author Debra Dank, comes a book about the discovery of having family members taken, and the secrets that come with that absence.

Debra Dank had long been desperate to visit the National Archives, to paint a fuller picture of her family, to add flesh to the name-bones and the few precious stories she possessed. What she discovered would shatter everything she thought she knew about her family and her past. She had been aware of her father's five siblings, some of whom had died before she could come to know them, but there were always whispers and gaps and silences.

Certainly, her parents had experiences that affected how Debra grew up, but hers seemed to be one of the very few Aboriginal families who had escaped having children stolen, who had viewed this horror from a seemingly safer distance. But the information she uncovered revealed that her paternal grandmother had given birth to ten children. Four had been taken from her.

Ankami is written from the perspective of those left behind, those who search always for the faces of stolen and lost Aboriginal children, now known only through a few cruel, thoughtless words written by a violent pastoral manager and a paternalistic colonial administrator, a footnote in a yellowed letter. This is a story about absences and the secrets that come with them, about unknown but somehow still present family. It is a story about what those speaking silences may be trying to tell as families sit around fires at night or celebrate together at a festive table. It is a story about the lost opportunity to grow with aunts and dads, the knowledge not shared and learned, the memories not made and a love that must remain one-sided and yearning. Ankami is a book like no other, a searing, unforgettable and deeply human account of sorrow and incomprehensible loss, and the essential power of memory.

Big Sky by Bruce Pascoe and Professor Ray Norris

Big Sky, when the emu left the earth is an exquisite conversation of sky knowledge between Aboriginal farmer and award-winning writer Bruce Pascoe and astrophysicist Professor Ray Norris. This meeting of science and philosophy, tempered by holistic knowledge gained from deep observation over a millennia offers a philosophy of peace for our age. It reframes astronomy not only as a science but as ethics and Law in our heavens. This dialogue places First Nations beliefs as rigorous, enduring knowledge, offering ecological and astronomical insights which could help navigate current climate threats. From Magabala s First Nations, First Knowledges series.

Ngurra Home by Carl Merrison and Hakea Hustler

We first met Mia in Black Cockatoo as she navigated her way through culture, Country and familial ties. The second book Dirrarn, follows Mia as she finds herself at boarding school navigating the challenges of living thousands of kilometres away from home and family and maintaining her sense of identity and belonging.

In this final book, Mia is now studying Conservation and Wildlife Science at university whilst working part-time for a wildlife sanctuary when she is suddenly called upon to return home to her family. She is faced with the responsibility to protect the country, which her Jiwalji has given her. It is time for Mia to fight for country, and her education, knowledge and experience in wildlife science will guide her.

A Good Kind of Trouble by Brooke Blurton and Melanie Saward

A brilliantly warm-hearted NEW series from Brooke Blurton and Melanie Saward, full of high school longing, friendship, footy matches, and dreams to change the world!

It's funny how your life changes. I used to be worried about playing footy and whether my first kiss would be with a boy or a girl. I used to worry about having enough time after school and putting my little cousins to bed to go for a run with my best friend Loz and whether she'd ever look at me the way she looks at my brother Poss.

But a new girl came to school and there's something about her ... I suddenly got the courage to stand up to our history teacher about teaching our true history with books written by blackfullas. And somehow she did too! At first we were on top of the world - and we might even have a chance to change it just a little bit. But now I'm banned from footy and I wonder ... is it all going to be worth it?