Ruby's Web

by Ellen Van Neerven

Ruby is starting year 7 at a new school. Her cousin Amber used to be her best friend, but she has started hanging out with the cool kids and pretends she doesn’t know Ruby anymore. Ruby dreads school every day. At the same time, the whole country is also debating the referendum for a First Nations Voice to Parliament, and Ruby is facing more and more nasty comments online from her classmates. The gap between the internet and real life is getting thinner and thinner. Ruby’s Web is about how to seek help when dealing with online bullying and racism, the connections that the internet makes possible, and the power of using your voice.

96 pages, Kindle Edition

Expected publication February 24, 2026

About the author

Ellen van Neerven (they/them) is an award-winning author, editor and educator of Mununjali (Yugambeh language group) and Dutch heritage. They write fiction, poetry, and non-fiction on unceded Turrbal and Yuggera land. van Neerven’s first book, Heat and Light (UQP, 2014), a novel-in-stories, was the recipient of the David Unaipon Award, the Dobbie Literary Award and the NSW Premier’s Literary Awards Indigenous Writers Prize. van Neerven’s poetry collection Comfort Food (UQP, 2016) won the Tina Kane Emergent Award and was shortlisted for the NSW Premier’s Literary Awards Kenneth Slessor Prize. Throat (UQP, 2020) is the recipient of Book of the Year, the Kenneth Slessor Prize, and the Multicultural Award at 2021 NSW Literary Awards, and the inaugural Quentin Bryce Award.