Trent Dalton

Yes, you read it right – one of our most audience-requested authors is coming to the Festival! Trent Dalton is a two-time Walkley Award-winning journalist and the international bestselling author of Lola in the Mirror, Love Stories and All Our Shimmering Skies.

His books have sold more than 1.5 million copies in Australia alone. The adaptation of his debut novel, Boy Swallows Universe, became Australia’s most watched Netflix TV show within three days of release and broke Top 10 lists in 60 countries across the world.

Professor Marcia Langton AO

Professor Marcia Langton AO, FASSA, AFTSE is a Yiman and Bidjara woman from Queensland. A major figure in Indigenous Australian rights and advocacy, Professor Langton was a key contributor to the Royal Commission into Aboriginal Deaths in Custody (1989), the Native Title Act (1993) and several policy initiatives. Currently, she is currently a chief investigator on numerous research projects concerned with Indigenous health, domestic and family violence, and Indigenous data and governance.

Professor Langton is widely published. Her most recent books include Welcome to Country: A Guide to Indigenous Australia (2021), Law: The Way of the Ancestors, co-authored with Professor Aaron Corn (2023), Dhoombak Goobgoowana: A History of Indigenous Australia and The University of Melbourne – Volume 1: Truth (2024), and 65,000 Years: A Short History of Australian Art.

Hannah Kent

Hannah Kent’s first novel, the multi-award-winning international bestseller Burial Rites, has been translated into more than 30 languages and is being adapted for film. Her second novel, The Good People, has been translated into 10 languages, nominated for numerous awards and is also being adapted for film.

Devotion, her third novel, published in 2021, won Booktopia’s Favourite Australian Book award, and was shortlisted for multiple industry awards. Her original feature film, Run Rabbit Run, was directed by Daina Reid and starred Sarah Snook.

Always Home Always Homesick is Hannah’s latest book, published in May 2025. She lives and works on Peramangk and Kaurna Country.

David Marr

David Marr has been a journalist for 50 years, most of that time with Fairfax and the ABC. His books include lives of Patrick White and Sir Garfield Barwick. He’s also written half a dozen Quarterly Essays on Australian politics and politicians. More recently, David published Killing for Country, A Family Story after the grim discovery that his great-great-grandfather served with the Queensland Native Police.

An updated edition of his essays and stories, My Country, was published in 2024. He is now presenting Late Night Live on ABC Radio National.