I’m James Bradley, novelist and critic. My books include the novels Wrack, The Deep Field, The Resurrectionist, Clade, and Ghost Species, the first two books of The Change Trilogy for young adults (The Silent Invasion, The Buried Ark and A Vastness of Stars), and a book of poetry, Paper Nautilus. I am also the author of a book of non-fiction, Deep Water: The World in the Ocean, and the editor of The Penguin Book of the Ocean. My novels, poetry and short fiction have won or been shortlisted for a number of literary awards, and Deep Water won the 2025 NSW Premier’s Award for Non-Fiction, a Gold Medal in the 2025 Nautilus Awards, and was shortlisted for the Prime Minster’s Award for Non-Fiction and the Queensland Literary Award for Non-Fiction.
Alongside my books I write and review for numerous Australian and international publications. Publications in which my work has appeared include The Times Literary Supplement, The Guardian, The Monthly, The Washington Post, Sydney Review of Books, Australian Book Review, Locus, The New York Review of Science Fiction, Griffith Review, Cosmos, Meanjin, Heat, The Weekend Australian, The Sydney Morning Herald, The Age and The Saturday Paper. In 2012 I was awarded the Pascall Prize for Criticism, and I’ve been nominated for a Walkley Award and shortlisted twice for the Bragg Prize for Science Writing. Links to a selection of my reviews and articles are available here.
I live in Sydney, Australia, with my partner, the novelist Mardi McConnochie, and our children, Annabelle and Theo. If you’d like to know more this interview in the Sydney Review of Books isn’t a bad place to begin.
Photo by Nicholas Purcell.
city of tongues 