I write about anxiety, intimacy and absurdity, in both fiction and nonfiction.

My debut novel, The Water Takes, is out in April 2026 with Summit Australia.
My first book, The First Time I Thought I Was Dying, a collection of non-fiction essays about the unruly body in late capitalism, was published by UQP in 2021 and won the Quentin Bryce Award.

My work has appeared in The Monthly, Overland, Meanjin, Island Magazine, Kill Your Darlings, the ABR, the AFR and The Guardian, and has been recognised in awards in Australia and internationally. I’m represented by the excellent Rach Crawford at Wolf Literary.

THE WATER TAKES

Coming April 2026.

An unimaginable apocalypse. A scared young girl. A stubborn old woman. Neither will survive without the other.

Pam is in her mid-seventies, widowed, and hiding from the world behind a caustic sense of humour. Her health is declining, and she’s afraid of dying alone, but her most pressing concern is complaining to the council about her waterlogged garden.

When Pam’s ten-year-old neighbour, Charlotte, is foisted upon her, a tentative friendship begins to unfurl, cracking open Pam’s hard exterior.

But the puddles in the garden become pools, and then sinkholes. Nowhere seems safe. With no help coming, Pam and Charlotte can only shelter in place for so long – eventually, they must attempt to navigate a catastrophically altered world.

The Water Takes is a work of astonishing literary imagination with the urgent page-turning propulsion of a thriller. Full of surprises and revelations and a sense of humanity that is never cliched or sentimental, The Water Takes will make you laugh and cry – and it will stay with you forever.

Pre-order from Summit Australia here.

Reviews

‘The Water Takes is an intimate epic; both a dazzling paean to hope and a staggering monument to loss. While Walker’s prose pulls tighter than a garotte wire, her characters are drawn with unspeakable tenderness. She has gifted us a uniquely Australian odyssey that trawls the deep wells of our collective anxieties and turns them into something heartfelt, horrifying, and wholly original.’
– Jordan Prosser

‘The Water Takes is a beautifully written blend of looming menace and sharp humour, along with a tender and timely reminder that connection is what saves us when catastrophe hits. This is dystopian fiction that feels as real, as human, as anything I've read. A dizzyingly good debut.’
– Jacqueline Bublitz

‘Atmospheric and utterly harrowing, Walker has written a disquieting account of grief and fortitude in a drowning world. This book devastated me.’
– Emily O’Grady

‘The Water Takes announces a new and exciting voice in Australian fiction. This beguiling, bedevilling novel about sinkholes and small towns had me gripped from the first page. Both a page-turning odyssey of survival and a heartfelt story of care and connection, The Water Takes is a novel we'll be talking about for years.’
– Dominic Amerena

‘What do you do when the world starts drowning? The Water Takes is haunting, terrifying and still somehow hopeful. Seventy-something Pam is one of the most vivid characters I’ve ever encountered – she made me laugh and roar and weep. I am in awe of Sarah Walker and this book.’
– Kate Mildenhall

THE FIRST TIME I THOUGHT I WAS DYING

A collection of essays about bodies and control.

We live in a world that expects us to be constantly in control of ourselves. Our bodies and minds, though, have other ideas.

In this striking debut, artist and writer Sarah Walker wrestles with the awkward spaces where anatomy meets society: body image and Photoshop, phobias and religion, sex scenes and onstage violence, death and grief. Her luminous writing is at once specific and universal as she mines the limits of anxiety, intimacy and control.

Sharp-witted and poignant, this collection of essays explores our unruly bodies and asks how we might learn to embrace our own chaos.

Winner of the 2021 Quentin Bryce Award.

More info and reviews here.