For lovers of politics, biography and history, 2025 will be a must-read year
In 2025, a year for state and federal elections, many notable books will be published that you should list now for future reading.
Summer is the season for books. Many of us take time out to read on the lounge, in the garden, at the beach or park. We give books to family and friends. We receive books; some we have asked for and others we can be pleasantly surprised by. I read books, write books, write about books, collect books, interview writers, ask politicians about their reading and think about books. I’m obsessed with books.
For more than a decade I have asked leading publishers what major titles in the subjects of politics, biography and history they have in the publication pipeline for the coming year. In 2025, a year for state and federal elections, many notable books will be published that you should list now for future reading.
Jacinta Nampijinpa Price has emerged as one of Australia’s most significant and influential politicians. In her forthcoming memoir, Matters of the Heart (HarperCollins, February), the Country Liberal Party senator and Coalition frontbencher writes about her journey from remote Alice Springs communities, overcoming disadvantage, to the frontline of national politics.
Former Queensland Labor premier turned media commentator Annastacia Palaszczuk is writing her memoir, which comes out in September (HarperCollins). Juliet Rieden is writing an authorised biography of former governor-general Quentin Bryce (Penguin Random House, October). A “tell-all” biography of Howard-era minister Kevin Andrews, who died this month, is to be published by Connor Court.
There will be a new memoir from legendary journalist and editor Ita Buttrose (Simon & Schuster). Her account of working for newspapers, magazines and television, and chairing the ABC board, will be fascinating. Another veteran journalist, Jana Wendt, returns with a collection of stories in The Far Side of the Moon (Text, July).
Phillip Adams’s must-read columns across many decades, most recently in The Weekend Australian Magazine, have been collected in Last Words? (Wilkinson, April). Journalist and academic Peter Greste’s The Correspondent (University of Queensland Press, April) is an updated edition of his memoir, The First Casualty, and is timed to coincide with a new feature film based on the book starring Richard Roxburgh.
Daniel Mulino and Julian Fitzgerald’s An Unbreakable Alliance (Connor Court) examines Australia-US relations and includes new interviews with former prime ministers and policymakers – an essential read in 2025.
The insightful William Maley examines the health of our political system in The Politics of Degraded Democracy (Australian Scholarly Publishing) out next month.
In The Age of Doubt (Monash, March), Tracey Kirkland and Gavin Fang collate essays looking at how we can rediscover trust in our leaders and institutions.
Former Labor minister Jenny Macklin asks if big policy reform is still possible (unlikely) in Making Progress (Melbourne University Publishing, April). Scott Prasser brings together academics, experts and practitioners to critically examine the Albanese government in Promise and Performance (Connor Court). Liam Byrne looks at how trade unions are making a comeback in No Greater Power (Melbourne University Publishing, May).
Kate Grenville wrestles with the troubled history of relations between white and black Australians in Unsettled: A Journey Through Time and Place published by Black Inc in April. Larissa Behrendt is writing The Shortest History of First Nations Australia (Black Inc, November), telling the story of a remarkable and resilient people across 65,000 years.
In Australia’s Place in the New Cold War (Black Inc, September), journalist Peter Hartcher examines our strengths and weaknesses as a nation and people at a time of change and volatility in the world. Nick Bryant has his unique take on the virtues and vices of his adopted home in Good Australia, Bad Australia (Penguin Random House, November). And John Lyons writes about the resistance of the Ukrainian people to the invasion by Russia in A Bunker in Kyiv (HarperCollins, May).
Robert Menzies was once forgotten by the Liberal Party but now he leads a publishing renaissance. Finding Menzies (Jeparit Press), edited by Damien Freeman with a foreword by Tony Abbott, examines politics, policy and personalities in the Menzies era. A volume of Menzies’ poetry will be published by Jeparit Press in collaboration with the Robert Menzies Institute.
Steve Vizard looks at Gallipoli in Nation, Memory, Myth (Melbourne University Publishing, April) and how it has come to shape our values and identity. The life of Edward “Weary” Dunlop is chronicled by Peter FitzSimons (Hachette, November). Brent Taylor assesses the military leadership of Thomas Blamey (HarperCollins, August). Garry Hills gives us the life of Gavin Long, Australia’s official World War II historian (NewSouth, April).
Virginia Haussegger looks at the feminist movement in Genderquake (NewSouth, September.) Robert Crawshaw turns his attention to Ben Chifley’s ill-fated attempt to nationalise the banking system in Battle of the Banks (Australian Scholarly Publishing, March). The selected papers and speeches of former High Court judges Michael Kirby (edited by Paul Vout) and William Gummow (edited by Aryan Mohseni) will be published by The Federation Press.
As part of Connor Court’s Australian Biographical Series, Gerard Henderson examines the life of former prime minister Malcolm Fraser and Fiona Wade tackles former South Australian premier Don Dunstan. The second volume in David Day’s biography of Bob Hawke, covering his prime ministerial years, is published by HarperCollins in August. And Stephen Wilks casts his eye over the life of Victorian premier Henry Bolte.
The 50th anniversary of Gough Whitlam’s dismissal by governor-general Sir John Kerr takes place in November 2025. Look out for Tom McIlroy’s Blue Poles (Hachette, March) and Peter Edwards’ The Dismissal (NewSouth, November). Whitlam’s account of his downfall, The Truth of the Matter (Melbourne University Publishing) – the biggest selling prime ministerial tome – will be republished in April.
My biography of Whitlam, Australia’s 21st prime minister, also will be published next year (HarperCollins). It is my fourth prime ministerial biography, after books on Menzies, Hawke and Paul Keating. It is the first full-life one-volume biography of Whitlam since his death in October 2014. The research and writing have been both enthralling and exhausting. I better get cracking on those remaining chapters.
I wish all readers a merry Christmas and happy new year.