The State of the (Writing) Nation is Writers Victoria’s annual address from a prominent Australian writer. It's a chance to reflect on what's happening and where we're heading in Australian literature and publishing. Award-winning novelist, memoirist and editor Alice Pung will give the 2021 address.

William Hazlitt wrote that ‘the smallest pain in our little finger causes us more concern…

Cigarettes are rapidly falling out of favour with everyone from policy-makers to smokers themselves. Philip Morris – the company behind Marlboro – have made ‘a dramatic decision’: they are ceasing operations as a cigarette company and relaunching as a health enterprise, dedicated to convincing the one billion smokers of the world to quit. Enter the ever-curious John Safran, the writer…

Set across present-day Melbourne, 1970s India and a not-too-distant future where climate change has ravaged both landscape and human hope, In Moonland is a portrait of one family across three generations, all grappling with their own mortality. This second novel from Melbourne writer Miles Allinson (Fever of Animals) has been praised by Helen Garner for its 'curious daring beauty’.

In…