Craig Silvey Books In Order

Publication Order of Standalone Novels

Publication Order of Short Stories/Novellas

Publication Order of Children's Books

Craig Silvey is an Australian screenwriter and author. He was born on January 1, 1982, and is from Fremantle in western Australia.

The author had a father that was a teacher of industrial arts and his mother worked as a teacher and a librarian. The family grew up in Dwellingup. He attended the Independent Pioneer Village School, a place he called unusual since it could be found in an open-air museum that was modeled after a gold mining town. The author describes the uniforms as strange, the girls wearing large white socks and straw hats and the boys wearing black caps that looked like cricket hats. Other than that, however, Silvey recounts that it was a regular private school that also had great teachers and small classes.

Silvey would then attend the Frederick Irwin Anglican School located in Mandurah. He then decided that instead of going to college he would work on writing. He did different jobs doing cleaning and menial labor so that he could write. The work paid off and he wrote Rhubarb at just 19 years old, seeing the novel be published in 2004 and gain him attention for his work. The book was picked as an inaugural book for the 2005 Perth International Arts Festival and was part of the Books Alive Campaign in Australia. His second novel was able to be worked on and finished in 2008, partially in thanks to a New Work Grant from the Australia Council.

This would be Silvey’s successful second novel titled Jasper Jones. The 2009 novel was a best seller and was received so well that it is thought to be a classic of modern Australian literature.

Silvey’s work has done so well that he has been published in many different territories and continents. His novel Jasper Jones has been recognized in multiple venues and for different awards, including making the shortlist for the International Dublin Literary Award, making a Michael J. Printz Award Honor, and being shortlisted for the Miles Franklin Literary Award. It also was named the Book of the Year by the Australian Book Industry Awards.

Craig Silvey would follow up his two first novels with the release of his best-selling novel Honeybee. Released in 2020, it was named the Dymocks Book of the Year in addition to winning the Best Fiction Indie Book Award. It made the shortlist for the book of the year from Literary Fiction at the ABIA Awards in 2021 and at the ABA Booksellers’ Choice Awards won Adult Fiction Book of the Year. The novel was also voted upon and named number one in the Better Reading Top 100!

Silvey has also been picked as one of the Best Young Australian Novelists by The Sydney Morning Harold. He has appeared on television as himself in Books That Made Us in 2021 and also has had his works adapted into movies. His novel Jasper Jones was adapted into a 2017 movie by the same name directed by Rachel Perkins that starred Levi Miller, Ken Long, and Toni Collette. His story The Amber Amulet was also turned into a 23 minute short which came out in 2013. His 2022 novel for a younger audience, Runt, will also be made into a feature.

Runt was also a winner at the 2023 Indie Book Awards, winning the children’s prize and Book of the Year. It was also the recipient of the Children’s Book Award from the BookPeople Book of the Year Awards, as well as the Children’s Book of the Year Award in 2023 from the CBCA.

The author counts among the influences on his work as Southern Gothic Fiction as well as classic regional American authors such as Lee, Twain, and Capote. He also likes Australian authors such as Gail Jones, Tim Winton, Christos Tsiolkas, Markus Zusak, and Shaun Tan. Silvey currently resides in Fremantle. In addition to writing, he also is a musician and is part of The Nancy Sikes band, playing the electric ukulele.

Rhubarb is the debut novel from Craig Silvey, featuring the main character of Eleanor Rigby. You may recognize the name from the Beatles song.

Eleanor is a small woman that also happens to be blind. She gets through the world with the help of Warren, her guide dog. Warren is overprotective but helps her get through places familiar to her. However, Eleanor is fatigued and tired of being cut off from the world. She also can’t quite help feeling like she is going nowhere in life, and at a very slow pace.

Then she finds something familiar in Ewan Dempsey’s sound. Ewan keeps to himself and makes and plays cello. Will his sounds awaken something in Eleanor, and if so, what will she do about it? Read this interesting debut from Silvey to find out!

Jasper Jones is the 2009 novel from Craig Silvey. If you are looking for something new, check this book out!

Charlie Bucktin is a boy of thirteen years old that is all about reading and is fairly precocious. One night in summer in 1965, it’s late and hot. Charlie notices a knock on his sleep-out’s window, a knock that happens to come from Jasper Jones.

Jasper is an outcast in Corrigan, the mining town. He’s rebellious, on his own, and mixed-race. For Charlie, he seems somewhat dangerous, but he’s also intriguing to him. Charlie helps him out by going into the night with him. Jasper leads the boy to a bush’s secret glade, and sees Jasper discover something terrible.

Charlie then keeps the secret as the town falls to suspicion. He fights with his mother, falls in love, and tries to keep his best friend quiet. He tries to figure out what is true or not, in a hot summer where everything in his life has the capacity to change.

Will he find out whether discovering the truth is possible, or why it is so difficult? What will happen to the secret that he keeps or to Jasper Jones? Read this book to find out what happens in the end!