Melissa Wray

Melissa is an Australian author who lives on the Bellarine Peninsula with her family. She enjoys beach walks and chasing sunsets. She has always loved reading and grew up near a cosy little library where she spent most of her younger years reading.

Melissa is passionate about education, in particular literacy, and believes the ability to read and write gives power to change. Her novels include The Lost Loot of Lima, Summer Change, The Ruby Locket and Destiny Road. Melissa’s writing has also won honourable mentions and featured in several anthologies.

Melissa has a strong sense of wonder and adventure. She loves to travel and has seen some incredible places including Cambodia, Egypt, Turkey and Africa. Melissa has also travelled closer to ho

If you like author Melissa Wray here is the list of authors you may also like

Buy books on Amazon

Melissa Wray similar authors

Shelby Matheson

Shelby Matheson is a born-and-raised Australian with a Bachelor in journalism and creative writing, as well as a graduate diploma in editing and publishing from USQ. She has been writing full-length novels since she was fourteen and has always known that being an author was the only career for her. In her spare time, she enjoys video games, drawing, crochet, collecting books (and even reading them), but her greatest passion will always be writing and escaping to the worlds in her head.

You can find her on Instagram and Threads as @shelbymathesonbooks
Buy books on Amazon
Isobelle Carmody

Isobelle Carmody began the first novel of her highly acclaimed Obernewtyn Chronicles while she was still in high school. The series has established her at the forefront of fantasy writing in Australia.

In addition to her young-adult novels, such as the Obernewtyn Chronicles and Alyzon Whitestarr, Isobelle's published works include several middle-grade fantasies. Her still-unfinished Gateway Trilogy has been favorably compared to The Wizard of Oz and the Chronicles of Narnia. The Little Fur quartet is an eco-fantasy starring a half-elf, half-troll heroine and is fully illustrated by the author herself.

Isobelle's most recent picture book, Magic Night, is a collaboration with illustrator Declan Lee. Originally published in Australia as The Wron
Buy books on Amazon
Kate Morton

KATE MORTON is an award-winning, New York Times and Sunday Times bestselling author. Her seven novels - The House at Riverton, The Forgotten Garden, The Distant Hours, The Secret Keeper, The Lake House, The Clockmaker's Daughter, and Homecoming - are published in over 45 countries, in 38 languages, and have all been number one bestsellers around the world.

Kate Morton was born in South Australia, grew up in the mountains of south-east Queensland, and now lives with her family in London and Australia. She has degrees in dramatic art and English literature, and harboured dreams of joining the Royal Shakespeare Company until she realised that it was words she loved more than performing. Kate still feels a pang of longing each time she goes to
Buy books on Amazon
Jane Caro

Jane Caro wears many hats; including author, lecturer, mentor, social commentator, columnist, workshop facilitator, speaker, broadcaster and award-winning advertising writer. Jane runs her own communications consultancy and lectures in Advertising Creative at The School of Communication Arts at UWS. She has published three books: The Stupid Country: How Australia is dismantling public education co-authored with Chris Bonnor (2007), The F Word. How we learned to swear by feminism co-authored with Catherine Fox (2008), and Just a Girl (UQP, 2011). She has also appeared on Channel 7’s Sunrise, ABC’s Q&A and ABC’s The Gruen Transfer.
Buy books on Amazon
Allayne L. Webster

Allayne is an author of Junior Fiction, Middle Grade and Young Adult literature. She’s the recipient of multiple arts grants, a Premier’s Reading Challenge Ambassador, and a former literary festival board member.
Paper Planes (Scholastic) was a 2016 Children’s Book Council of Australia (CBCA) Notable/shortlisted for the Adelaide Festival Awards for Literature. A Cardboard Palace (MidnightSun) was a 2018 CBCA Notable and published in Sweden. Our Little Secret (Scholastic) was listed for the Golden Inkys and has recently been republished by Ligature Press. The Centre of My Everything (PenguinRandomHouse) was listed in the 2019 Davitt Awards (crime) and shortlisted in the 2020 Adelaide Festival Awards for Literature. Sensitive (UQP) is publishe
Buy books on Amazon
Suzy Zail

A Family lawyer in her past life, Suzy is now the bestselling author of more than 14 books for adults, teens and children. Suzy is best-known for her young adult novels, Inkflower, The Wrong Boy, Alexander Altmann A10567 and I am Change, stories that shine a light on injustice. She is also the founder of Give A Girl a Book, shipping more than 10,000 books (donated by school libraries and students) to girls in Africa who couldn’t otherwise afford them. Suzy's novels have won Reader's choice for Book of the Year for older readers, in the Children's Book Council of Australia Book of the Year Awards, been shortlisted for the Young Australians Best Book Awards and the U.K. Coventry Inspiration Book Awards and have been named an Outstanding Inter
Buy books on Amazon
Helen Edwards

Dr Helen Edwards is an Australian author and speaker who writes stories of nature, magic and history. She has a PhD in Psychology and a long background working in mental health.

Helen is a mid-career SA Literary Fellow in 2025, supported by Writers' SA and the State Library of South Australia. Her fellowship project - A Light on the Rocks - features the true history of the wreck of the S.S Admella and the Cape Jaffa lighthouse, as well as exploring themes of ocean conservation. It will be published on 28/1/26 with Riveted Press. This project was also supported by the History Trust of South Australia’s South Australian History Fund.

Set across two timelines, connected by place, mystery, and magic, A Light on the Rocks is a haunting tale, abou
Buy books on Amazon
Lili Wilkinson

Lili Wilkinson is the award-winning author of eighteen books for young people, including The Erasure Initiative and After the Lights Go Out. Lili has a PhD from the University of Melbourne, and is a passionate advocate for YA and the young people who read it, establishing the Inky Awards at the Centre for Youth Literature, State Library of Victoria. Her latest book is A Hunger of Thorns.
Buy books on Amazon
Tristan Bancks

Tristan Bancks tells stories for the page and screen. His books for kids and teens include Two Wolves, The Fall, Detention, the Tom Weekly series, and Nit Boy. Ginger Meggs, Tristan’s 100th anniversary book of short stories, is based on characters created by his great-great uncle, Jimmy Bancks, in 1921. His books have won and been shortlisted for many awards, including a Children’s Book Council of Australia Honour Book, the Prime Minister’s Literary Awards, ABIA, YABBA, KOALA, NSW Premier’s Literary Awards and Queensland Literary Awards. His latest release is Cop & Robber, a nailbiting crime story for age 10+.

Tristan is a writer-ambassador for literacy non-profit Room to Read. He is currently working with producers to develop a number of hi
Buy books on Amazon
Kate Gordon

Kate Gordon grew up in a small town by the sea in Tasmania. She is the author of numerous award-winning picture-books and novels for younger readers, including Aster’s Good, Right Things, published by Yellow Brick Books in November, 2020, which won the CBCA Book of the Year for younger readers in 2021, and was shortlisted in the Tasmanian Literary Awards in 2022. The companion novels, Xavier in the Meantime and Indigo in the Storm were published in 2021 and 2023. Whalesong was published by Yellow Brick Books in 2022, following Kate’s residency at the Maritime Museum of Tasmania. Kate continues to write novels and picture books from a cottage overlooking the river and the mountain on the Eastern Shore of Hobart. She has two daughters, an eld
Buy books on Amazon
Jane Higgins

Buy books on Amazon
Pip Harry

Pip Harry is an Australian children’s author and journalist. Her middle grade novel, The Little Wave, won the CBCA 2020 Book of the Year Award and the Speech Pathology Australia Book of the Year. It was shortlisted for the 2020 NSW Premier's Literary Awards – Ethel Turner Prize for Young People's Literature.

Her young adult novels include I’ll Tell You Mine, Head of the River, and Because of You, shortlisted for the CBCA Book of the Year Awards, Victorian Premier's Literary Award and Queensland Literary Awards.

Are You There, Buddha? is a 2022 CBCA Notable book and was nominated for the Ethel Turner prize.

Pip’s latest middle grade novel, August & Jones is out now.
Buy books on Amazon
Ellie Marney

Ellie Marney is a multi-award-winning, bestselling author of thrillers for teens and adults. Her titles include the New York Times bestseller None Shall Sleep, the Kirkus-starred sequel, Some Shall Break, and the electrifying finale All Shall Mourn. Ellie's other titles include ARA Historical Novel Prize-nominated The Killing Code and Australian library favorite Every Breath. Her debut adult thriller No One Is Safe is arriving 10th February 2026.

Ellie has spent a lifetime researching in mortuaries, talking to autopsy specialists, and asking former spies how to make explosives from household items - now she lives quite sedately in south-eastern Australia with her family. Find sign-ups for her newsletter, The Black Hand, at her website, an
Buy books on Amazon
Lynette Noni

Australian author Lynette Noni studied journalism, academic writing, and human behaviour at university before venturing into the world of fiction. She is the #1 bestselling and award-winning author of THE PRISON HEALER series, THE MEDORAN CHRONICLES, and the WHISPER duology. To date, her books have sold more than one million copies in over 20 countries across the globe.
Buy books on Amazon
S.D. Smith

S. D. Smith is the author of The Green Ember Series, a million+ selling adventure saga featuring heroic #RabbitsWithSwords. The Green Ember spent time as the number one bestselling audiobook in the world on Audible. He is also the author of the madcap Mooses with Bazookas: And Other Stories Children Should Never Read as well as the touching throwback adventure, The Found Boys. Finally, he has co-authored two fantasy adventure novels with his son (J. C. Smith), Jack Zulu and the Waylander’s Key and Jack Zulu and the Girl with Golden Wings. Smith’s stories are captivating readers across the globe who are hungry for “new stories with an old soul.”

Though packed with old school virtue and moral imagination, Smith doesn't merely create "safe" sto
Buy books on Amazon
Amy Doak

Buy books on Amazon
Trent Dalton

Trent Dalton writes for the award-winning The Weekend Australian Magazine. A former assistant editor of The Courier-Mail, he has won a Walkley, been a four-time winner of the national News Awards Feature Journalist of the Year Award, and was named Queensland Journalist of the Year at the 2011 Clarion Awards for excellence in Queensland media. His writing includes several short and feature-length film screenplays. His latest feature film screenplay, Home, is a love story inspired by his non-fiction collection Detours: Stories from the Street (2011), the culmination of three months immersed in Brisbane's homeless community, the proceeds of which went back to the 20 people featured within its pages. His journalism has twice been nominated for
Buy books on Amazon
Gabbie Stroud

Buy books on Amazon
Kelli Hawkins

Kelli Hawkins writes reports for a private investigator, as well as working on novels for adults and children. She lives in Newcastle with her two teenagers. Over the years she’s travelled whenever possible and worked all kinds of jobs. Kelli’s been a political journalist, a graphic designer, a mystery shopper – even a staple remover. When she’s not writing she’s planning a holiday – or dreaming of one. Or reading, of course.

She writes under the name Kelli Hawkins for her adult novels, and Kelli Anne Hawkins for her children’s books.
Buy books on Amazon
R.A. Stephens

R. A. Stephens is a teacher by day, writer, editor and publisher by night. She is passionate about the written word, what stories can do to take a reader to a new world and open our eyes to love, compassion, the bigger picture and much more. When not working, teaching or writing, she enjoys living in the country and spending time with her kids and cats. R. A. Stephens is a teacher and careers advisor and works with teenagers to help them think about their career past school. She is working on a large range of stories for children with a focus on science, mathematics and investigation. R.A. Stephens lives in country Queensland and writes from the experience of both city and country life.
Buy books on Amazon
Kerryn Mayne

Kerryn Mayne is an author, former wedding photographer, and current police officer. When not at work attempting to solve crime, she is writing about it or preparing an endless stream of snacks for her four children. Kerryn lives in the bayside suburbs of Melbourne with her husband, children and a highly suspect lovebird. She only owns 11 copies of The Hobbit (for now).
Lenny Marks Gets Away With Murder is her debut novel.
Buy books on Amazon
S.E. Tolsen

S. E. Tolsen is the pseudonym of husband and wife writing team Emma Olsen and Vere Tindale. Bunny, their debut novel, was initially adapted from their screenplay Crepuscular, a nominee for Best Feature Screenplay at the 2018 Renegade Film Festival in Atlanta, Georgia before it was turned into a novel and published by Pan Macmillan Australia. It has since gone on to win Best Horror Novel 2023 at the Aurealis Awards in Australia.
Buy books on Amazon
Shelby Matheson

Shelby Matheson is a born-and-raised Australian with a Bachelor in journalism and creative writing, as well as a graduate diploma in editing and publishing from USQ. She has been writing full-length novels since she was fourteen and has always known that being an author was the only career for her. In her spare time, she enjoys video games, drawing, crochet, collecting books (and even reading them), but her greatest passion will always be writing and escaping to the worlds in her head.

You can find her on Instagram and Threads as @shelbymathesonbooks
Buy books on Amazon
Kiralee Strong

Buy books on Amazon
Tina Strachan

Buy books on Amazon
R.A. Stephens

R. A. Stephens is a teacher by day, writer, editor and publisher by night. She is passionate about the written word, what stories can do to take a reader to a new world and open our eyes to love, compassion, the bigger picture and much more. When not working, teaching or writing, she enjoys living in the country and spending time with her kids and cats. R. A. Stephens is a teacher and careers advisor and works with teenagers to help them think about their career past school. She is working on a large range of stories for children with a focus on science, mathematics and investigation. R.A. Stephens lives in country Queensland and writes from the experience of both city and country life.
Buy books on Amazon