The runner-up to the Book of the Year, Bill Scott’s Boori, illustrated by A. M. Hicks (OUP, designed by Vicki Hamilton; typeset by Savage & Co.; printed in Hong Kong), is a generally pleasing production with a strong vertical stress to its design, and very dark pages (set in Plantin). I thought the illustrations a little tentative, but the dustjacket (by Lin Onus) is rich and exciting. In a couple of points of detail, the production is disappointing. It has running headlines, which are absurd in a work of fiction; and the head margin varies by two to three millimetres between the half-title, the title, the imprint page, and the contents page. There is no half-title blurb, but facing the title is a generously placed acknowledgement to the assistance of the Literature Board (the only such note in the five books mentioned in this column).

Ruth Park’s commended novel Come Danger, Come Darkness, illustrated by Tony Oliver (Hodder and Stoughton; typeset by Press Etching Pty Ltd; printed in Hong Kong), is another very low-priced ($5.95) cased book. A single, circular drawing is used as the headpiece to all the chapters. It may sound austere, but the result is effective. The book is very evenly printed, and there is a pleasing harmony of blues and greens between the jacket, the case and the printed endpaper. The two-line title is left­justified on the jacket, with a gulf after the word ‘Come’ at the start of each line. It works better on the title page in a centred arrangement, except that here the lines are a little far apart. Nevertheless, this is a commendable, straightforward production.

Percy Trezise and Dick Roughsey’s The Quinkins (Collins; typeset by Dalley Photocomposition; printed in Hong Kong) seemed to me a good choice for the award of Picture Book of the Year. It begins with an undecorated title-page opening, followed by fourteen magnificent double-spread illustrations, alive with a feeling of northern Australia: clear blue skies, dark trees in silhouette, landscapes of ochre and olive. They are lovely pictures to look into, for they reveal their details gradually. The printing is fine, and the colour-matching across the double-spreads (i.e., from one side of the sheet to the other) is perfect, even if the alignment of left and right is a couple of millimetres out in two or three spreads. The delightful wrap-around jacket is repeated as a laminated paper case.

There is nothing in The Quinkins to indicate the respective roles of Trezise and Roughsey as author and artist; they are simply shown as joint authors. The same is true of a commended picture book, The Riverboat Crew, by Andrew and Janet McLean (OUP; typeset by Savage & Co.; printed in Hong Kong). This is a picture-book in the sophisticated English tradition. It is stylishly put together, and the often-humorous drawings show a delicate and restrained use of colour.