The Aurealis Awards winners for 2009 were announced a few weeks ago (oh yes, always up-to-date news on this site): lots of Australian SF/F books to add to your reading list if you hadn’t got to them yet, and it’s always interesting to read the judges’ comments on the almost-winners.

The February Bullsheet and other Australian SF organisers are doing a big push for Australian authors this year. If you’re eligible to nominate someone for a Hugo Award, why not make it an Australian? To help you get started, Twelfth Planet Press is letting you try some of their publications free.

The Perth Writers Festival line-up is out. Lures for me include Saturday afternoon’s It’s Not Just the Cover… and From Cyber to…?, Sunday’s Escaping the Pigeon Hole, and, weirdly enough, the Haircuts by Children, which is exactly what it says it is. Surrender to an 8-year-old with scissors…

A great set of tips [from Book Thingo] for writing Australian characters — add your own tips in the comments. And they also have an Aussie Authors challenge for the year too [hosted by Book Lover Book Reviews, as per the clarification in the comments].

And via that site, I discovered that ebooks.com, one of the oldest ebook retailers, is actually based in Western Australia (their prices in are in US dollars though).

And, lastly, this article exactly encapsulates why I’m puzzled as to why Amazon was so universally vilified in last weekend’s Macmillan debacle, especially by authors. Yeah, it behaved like a dick, but authors — you (generally) won’t see a single extra cent when publishers put their ebook prices up…you might even lose sales as readers turn to the cheaper options. The whole situation smacks of things the big companies know that we the reader don’t, all related to the iPad/iBook release.

In personal news, I got a very nice email from a very nice reader who really enjoyed my latest book, The Frog Prince’s Daughters. Readers: make an author’s a day — email them to let them know you like their work.