Australia's First University Press
Melbourne University Publishing

Our 2025 Gift Guide

It's the season of the gift
We have books for every reader on your list. Whether you’re shopping for a passionate reader, a lifelong learner, or someone who loves beautifully crafted books, these thought-provoking and visually stunning works make the perfect gift[JM1] .
 
We also have five $200 Readings vouchers to be won! Click here for details.
 
 
Miegunyah Indigenous
 
  • Beyond the Meeting of the Waters by Dr Wayne Atkinson and Catherine Guinness is a penetrating and deeply humane insight into the power of the voice, the spear of the pen and the potential of collective organisation.
  • Saltwater Fella by John Moriarty is a story of a childhood surviving harsh routines and poverty, hunger and racism in church institutions. It is about finding out who he is through his soccer skills and the start of a long career in advocacy for Aboriginal rights and self-determination.
  • First Tasmanians by Shayne Breen traces the 40,000 years of Aboriginal exploration, land settlement, hunting practices and controlled burning on the island. It is a story of courage, continuity and an unwavering commitment to revitalising connections between country, culture and community.
 
Politics and Current Affairs
 
  • Turbulence by Clinton Fernandes is an indispensable manual for understanding the present and navigating the future. It addresses the serious challenges Australia faces as Trump upends geopolitical tectonic plates and shows that a shrewd calculus is at work behind the chaos.
  • Making Progress by Jenny Macklin takes us into the policy engine room and details how she went about developing transformational initiatives. She explains how she became a policy wonk, and interviews key policymakers who share how they war-gamed ways to turn good policy ideas into reality.
  • The Most Dangerous Man in the World by Andrew Fowler takes us inside the negotiations with the White House, revealing a startling story of false hope, courage, resolve and the extraordinary resilience of Julian Assange. 
 
Personal Development
 
  • Nerves of Steel by Ger Post offers high-pressure performance tactics for any sport or discipline, revealing what we can learn from athletes such as Cristiano Ronaldo and Mackenzie Arnold about thriving when the heat is on. 
  • Autistics at Work by Sandra Thom-Jones is essential reading for autistic individuals who are in, or considering entering, the workforce. This accessible guide includes tools and activities, and each chapter concludes with practical advice for autistic employees and their non-autistic colleagues and employers.
  • Coping in Good Times and Bad by Erica Frydenberg brings together what we know about coping so we can create a life of health, joy, satisfaction, resilience and wellbeing, with an update on how to deal with the newer pressures of cost of living.
 
Illustrated Books
 
  • Shutter City by Robyn Annear presents city street views spanning the hurly-burly decades of the 1850s to 1870s, between the gold rushes and Marvellous Melbourne.
  • Great Properties of the Riverina and Upper Murray by Richard Allen and Kimbal Baker tells the story of sixteen significant properties in the region. This book brings these estates to life in all their grandeur to tell stories of adaptation and change, and reveal their owners' and occupants' ambitions and dreams.
  • Worlds of Wonder edited by Daniel Hahn is a treasury of childhood stories and illustrations. Whether you want to rediscover the classics of your childhood or find new stories to delight the children in your life, here is all the inspiration you need.
 
Society and Culture
 
  • No Power Greater by Liam Byrne is the compelling story of the acts of rebellion and solidarity that have shaped Australia's past and shows that unions are far from history.
  • A Fair Day’s Work by Sean Scalmer traces 150 years of campaigns for rights and for the fair distribution of productivity gains, showing how these movements successfully reduced the length of the standard working week, and how economic, social and political shifts since the early 1980s have stalled this long-term progress.
  • Fathering by Alistair Thomson, John Murphy, Kate Murphy, Johnny Bell and Jill Barnard transforms our understanding of men's experience of parenthood, showing how fathers from diverse backgrounds, including migrant and Indigenous dads, have negotiated their role in changing circumstances.
 
Australian History
 
  • Nation, Memory, Myth by Steve Vizard brings an original perspective to the foundational myth of Gallipoli as a sacred bearer of Australian national values and identity.
  • Early Photography in Colonial Australia by Elisa deCourcy explores the origins of the photographic culture that continues to shape how we see the world. This book offers the first major study of photography's arrival and establishment in colonial Australia.
  • The Southern Frontier by Rohan Howitt traces Australia's Antarctic obsession from its origins in the nineteenth century to the creation of the Australian Antarctic Territory and a permanent national Antarctic program in the 1930s and 1940s.
 
Environment
 
  • The River by Chris Hammer takes the reader on a journey through Australia's largest river system, the Murray-Darling Basin. This updated edition includes a new introduction from the author.
  • Beyond Green by Lesley Head interrogates the ways the cultures of nature have operated in Australia across time, and how these ways of thinking and being limit our capacity to deal with the challenges of the climate change and biodiversity crises.
  • The Big Fix by Albert Palazzo proposes a defence policy centred on the strategic defensive, which presents the best military fit for Australia, given its geography and the current state of military technology.
 
Memoir and Autobiography
 
  • 90 Seconds to Midnight by Charlotte DeCroes Jacobs tells the story of Hiroshima survivor Setsuko Nakamura Thurlow's 70-year crusade, and how she shifted the global discussion from nuclear deterrence to humanitarian consequences - the key to crafting the landmark Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons.
  • 58 Facets by Marika Sosnowski weaves together the narratives of Holocaust survivors and Israeli war criminals with Syrian activists, revolutionaries and dissenters. It challenges us to go beyond the links we see in our lives to our felt experiences of the law, violence and revolution, and how these experiences travel across bodies, space and time.
  • Honey from the Ground by Soren Tae Smith upends genre and resists explanation. It follows the rhythms of lived time and memory, accepting illness and limitation. Through glimpses of a personal past, it rummages for what can be saved and known even in the absence of answers.
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  • Posted On 12 Nov 2025