Next month we’ll be partnering with Libro.fm to offer our customers access to audiobooks. Up until now, subscriptions or purchases of audiobooks has been limited to Apple or Amazon’s Audible. Libro.fm offers a similar catalogue to both of those companies. Libro.fm is an employee-owned company based in the US; it was founded in 2014 with the aim to provide locally owned bookshops with the means to offer their customers access to audiobooks.

Audiobooks are the fastest growing format in the publishing industry. When Libro.fm becomes available in late July, it will have over 325,000 books in its catalogue, including many Australian titles. The profits it makes from the sale of audiobooks is shared with its local partner bookshops; when you buy from Apple or Audible, all the profits go overseas.

Those of you who read my column may recall that I’ve been trying podcasts on my bike commute to work, and recently I have been trying some audiobooks. I tried The Postcard, an autobiographical novel by French author Anne Berest, translated by Tina Kover, and was immediately hooked. The print version will be published later this year in Australia by Europa. It tells the story of the narrator’s search for the sender of a mysterious postcard that arrives at her parents’ home one day; it has no greeting, just the names of the author’s great uncles and aunts who died in Auschwitz. The search for an answer takes us on a tragic and moving quest. It’s also a strong indictment of the endemic anti-Semitism in French society, both during the war and today. We’ll be sending out information on accessing audiobooks next month.

Like my colleague Alison Huber, I also attended our booksellers conference in Adelaide. For me, it was a reaffirmation of the power of literature to effect change. Suzie Miller, the award-winning author of the play Prima Facie, talked about the impact of her work here and overseas. The play about a young female lawyer confronting the biases of the legal system in relation to sexual assault cases has been a smash-hit here and in London and New York. It’s so powerful that in the UK, judges hearing sexual assault cases use it to instruct juries prior to their deliberations. Suzie has refashioned the play into a gripping novel that will be published later this year.

Also at our conference was playwright Jane Harrison; her play The Visitors premiered in Sydney in 2020. It tells the story of Captain Cook’s arrival from the perspective of the original inhabitants of the country; it confers on them the dignity and respect that was taken from them by the colonisers, as they deliberate on what their response to the visitors should be. Like Suzie, Jane has expanded her play into a novel as well; it too will be published later this year.

Australia Reads is a not-for-profit collaboration between the Australian Library and Information Association, the Australian Publishers Association, the Australian Society of Authors and BookPeople (formerly the Australian Booksellers Association). Australia Reads is on a mission to get more people reading more books, more often. In 2021, the organisation conducted some research into the reading habits of Australians and found that 25% of people had not read or listened to a book in the preceding year; a similar survey in 2017 showed that, by comparison, only 8% of people had not read or listened to a book in the last year. Other surveys have also shown that 44% of Australians have low or very low literacy levels. The ability to read is essential to survive in contemporary society and reading books has additional benefits. Research has shown that reading books improves brain connectivity, increases vocabulary and comprehension, empowers people to empathise with other people; aids in sleep readiness; reduces stress; lowers blood pressure and heart rate; fights depression symptoms; and prevents cognitive decline and social isolation as people age.

If you have found your reading has dropped off lately, these are convincing reasons to take it up again. You can follow the work of Australia Reads by subscribing here.