‘A CENTURY OF INFLUENCE: AUSTRALIAN STUDENT CHRISTIAN MOVEMENT 1896-1996’ by Renate Howe (University of New South Wales Press)

‘DESOLATE BEAUTY’ by Trudy Adams (Ark House Press)

‘HEBREWS: A NEW COVENANT COMMENTARY’ by William Dumbrell (Redeemer Baptist Press)

‘LOSING MY RELIGION: UNBELIEF IN AUSTRALIA’ by Tom Frame (University of New South Wales Press)

‘MONTGOMERY OF TASMANIA: HENRY AND MAUD MONTGOMERY IN AUSTRALASIA’ by Robert Withycombe (Acorn Press)

‘THE THIRD CHOICE: ISLAM, DHIMMITUDE AND FREEDOM’ by Mark Durie (Deror Books)

‘THE TRELLIS AND THE VINE: THE MINISTRY MIND-SHIFT THAT CHANGES EVERYTHING’ by Colin Marshall & Tony Payne (Matthias Media)

2010 ACBOY JUDGES

ALEX CRAWFORD holds degrees in arts, law and theology. He is a practising barrister in Brisbane. Outside the law, he is interested in books, music and seeing the Brisbane Lions win. Alex is married to Penny. They have three children and attend St Mark’s Anglican Church, Clayfield. He is the secretary of the Mathew Hale Public Library based in Brisbane.

NANCY KROEGER combines her passion for books and literature with her love of numbers and people by working at Ridley Melbourne Mission and Ministry College. She is celebrating her eleventh year working in the College Bookshop as bookkeeper. Her most recent read was the challenging Wolf Hall by Hilary Mantel. Nancy is married to a Presbyterian minister and church planter. They have three adult children, two sons-in-law and a first grandchild born this May.

DAVID STARLING teaches New Testament and Theology at Morling College in Sydney and is a member of Macquarie Baptist Church. He studied English and History at Sydney University and worked as a high school English teacher in Western Sydney before theological study at Moore College and Morling College and pastoral ministry in Sydney’s inner west. He is married to Nicole and has three young children.

JOIN US AT THE AWARD PRESENTATION

The 2010 Australian Christian Book of the Year will be announced and prizes awarded during a lunch at the Robert White Hall, Level 1, 156 Collins Street, Melbourne, on 10 August 2010 at midday (for a 12.30 start).

The awards will be preceded by an address by inspiring 2009 Christian Book of the Year author, Naomi Reed, and an engaging performance by poet, Cameron Semmens.

$40 per guest. ($10 for Teen Writer contestants.) To book seats call 1300 13 7725 or write to awards@spcka.org.au

Michael Collie
Awards Coordinator
Australian Christian Literature Society
PO Box 198, Forest Hill, Victoria 3131, Australia
Free call 1300 13 7725
Mobile 0423 244 481

More photos from can be found on the CBAA facebook group:
http://www.facebook.com/photo_search.php?oid=221324476624&view=all.

Further details can be found on the CBAA website.

The Bookseller: Competitors Save 14 Wesley Owen branches
http://www.thebookseller.com/news/107475-page.html

Wesley Owen has confirmed that 14 stores have been saved after its parent company IBS-STL went into administration, with “a healthy degree of interest” in the remaining 26. IBS-STL’s other businesses—Authentic Media and STL Distribution—have been bought separately.

Russell Cash, partner at Baker Tilly Restructuring & Recovery, said this morning (21st December) that eight stores had been bought by Christian bookseller Koorong, as well as the Wesley Owen trading name and website domain. The firm went into administration on Friday (18th December).

Koorong has bought Wesley Owen stores in Bath, Birmingham, Bristol, Bromley, Colraine, Derby, Glasgow and York. Bookselling chain, Christian Literature Crusade International (CLC) has bought a further six stores including Bolton, Cambridge, Coventry, Guildford, Kingston and Stockport.

Christian Retailing Dot Com: Australian retailer’s ‘learn as we go’ approach
http://www.christianretailing.com/index.php/newsletter/latest-etailing/20603-australian-retailers-learn-as-we-go-approach

Paul Bootes, managing director of Koorong, said that the company–which has 18 stores across Australia–would be adopting a “learn as we go” approach with the eight Wesley Owen stores it purchased last month as part of the breakup of IBS-STL UK.
…

“Our market share in Australia is around 60% of the market, and we felt that an overseas opportunity would enable us to grow more quickly than at home,” Bootes told Christian Retailing. “As Australians, we have an historical and cultural relationship with the U.K., and when the STL opportunity came up, we thought we may be able to do something.”

He added: “Clearly some of the Wesley Owen sites were not profitable because of the high rents that are charged in the U.K. We are focusing on the bigger stores with more established volumes of sales. We have always been specialist retailers, so hopefully we understand the business as well as anyone. All that being said, it is certainly going to be hard work to make it work well.”

Press Release from Koorong, December 22, 2009
http://www.wesleyowen.com/WesleyOwenSite/cm/koorong_press_release.htm

“It is with great excitement that I announce Koorong’s acquisition of eight Wesley Owen retail stores, wesleyowen.com and Authentic Publishing. The stores will continue to trade under the Wesley Owen brand. The publishing company will continue to use the Authentic and Paternoster imprints. We are all very excited about this development, but a little daunted by the work involved.” Paul Bootes, Managing Director.

The Wesley Owen stores purchased are located in Glasgow, York, Coleraine, Bath, Birmingham, Bromley, Derby and Bristol. The next few months will be busy as we settle into our new role in the UK and join with the staff and management to continue and expand this high street Christian ministry and web store wesleyowen.com. We look forward to the future with our new team in the UK as we remain committed to spreading God’s Word and building up the body of Christ by offering an extensive range of Christian books, Bibles, music, software, DVDs, gifts and more at the best prices.

WesleyOwen.com will continue to be one of the leading Christian e-commerce websites in the UK. Customers can continue to place orders with confidence. Service and availability will improve greatly during 2010, and we are looking forward to new and exciting developments to the site.

Rick Christian, president of the Colorado Springs-based literary agency Alive Communications, commented for CBA’s letter, saying, “The predatory pricing of Amazon, Target, and Wal-Mart threatens the entire publishing industry…. These retailers can sell hyper-reduced books as ‘loss leaders’ for a time, but it’s an unsustainable model that, without intervention, will shutter hundreds of book stores, force many publishers out of business, gut trade associations, and significantly reduce the number of self-sustaining authors.”

Christian said such practices eventually will limit titles available to consumers and raise prices. “It’s a scenario in which everybody loses in the long run, unless decisive action is taken immediately,” he said. He and his agency have represented very popular authors and titles, such as the “Left Behind” series (65 million unit sales), The Message Bible (10 million sales), and Karen Kingsbury novels (15 million sales).

To read CBA’s letter to the Department of Justice in the USA, please download this file – InvestigationRequestLetter

This article was originally published on the CBA News website on the 23rd of December, 2009. http://www.cbanews.org/article.php?id=1048