Award Winners

Winner of the Miles Franklin Literary Award, Winner of the Western Australian Premiers Book Award, Winner of the Kate Challis RAKA Award. Harley, a man of Nyoongar ancestry, finds himself at a difficult point in the history of his country, family and self. As the apparently successful outcome of his white grandfathers enthusiastic attempts to isolate and breed the first white man born, he wants to be a failure. But would such failure mean his Nyoongar ancestors could label him a success? And how can the attempted genocide represented by his family history be told? Oceanic in its rhythms and understanding, brilliant in its use of language and image, moving in its largeness of spirit, compelling in its narrative scope and style, Benang is a novel of celebration and lament, of beginning and return, of obliteration and recovery, of silencing and of powerful utterance. Both tentative and daring, it speaks to the present and a possible future through stories, dreams, rhythms, songs, images and documents mobilised from the incompletely acknowledged and still dynamic past. Benang is brilliant. It is a mature, complex, sweeping historical novel which will remind people of Rushdie, Carey and Grenville at their best. This is an absolute page turner and in the end we are left with a sense of joy and gratitude that such stories are still possible that the silence has been broken. Sydney Morning Herald... Benang soars to the level of superb storytelling with an emotional punch to the guts, not unlike Toni Morrisons Beloved. Weekend Australian. Haunting and poignant, Benang pierces the heart even as it seeks to lance the savage bleeding of the wounds of white settlement in Australia. Canberra Times.

Zuhur, an Omani student at a British university, is caught between the past and the present. As she attempts to form friendships and assimilate in Britain, she can’t help but ruminate on the relationships that have been central to her life. Most prominent is her strong emotional bond with Bint Amir, a woman she always thought of as her grandmother, who passed away just after Zuhur left the Arabian Peninsula. As the historical narrative of Bint Amir’s challenged circumstances unfurls in captivating fragments, so too does Zuhur’s isolated and unfulfilled present, one narrative segueing into another as time slips, and dreams mingle with memories. The eagerly awaited new novel by the winner of the Man Booker International Prize, Bitter Orange Tree is a profound exploration of social status, wealth, desire, and female agency. It presents a mosaic portrait of one young woman’s attempt to understand the roots she has grown from, and to envisage an adulthood in which her own power and happiness might find the freedom necessary to bear fruit and flourish. An extraordinary novel from a 'remarkable' Booker Prize-winning author who has 'constructed her own novelistic form' (James Wood, The New Yorker) that follows one young Omani woman as she builds a life for herself in Britain and reflects on the relationships that have made her.

During a hot Melbourne summer Jovan’s cleaning work at a bayside hospital is disrupted by acts of graffiti and violence becoming increasingly malevolent. For Jovan the mysterious words that must be cleaned away dislodge the poetry of the past. He and his wife Suzana were forced to flee Sarajevo and the death of their children.Intensely human, yet majestic in its moral vision, Black Rock White City is an essential story of Australia’s suburbs now, of displacement and immediate threat, and the unexpected responses of two refugees as they try to reclaim their dreams. It is a breathtaking roar of energy that explores the immigrant experience with ferocity, beauty and humour.

Black Tide is the second of Peter Temple's Jack Irish thrillers.Jack Irish - lawyer, gambler, part-time cabinetmaker, finder of missing people - is recovering from a foray into the criminal underworld when he agrees to look for the son of an old workmate of his father's. It's an offer he soon has cause to regret, as the trail of Gary Connors leads him into the world of Steven Levesque, millionaire and political kingmaker. The more Jack learns about Levesque's powerful corporation, the more convinced he becomes that at its heart lies a secret. What he's destined to find out is just how deadly that secret is...Black Tide has been made into an ABC tele-movie starring Guy Pearce as Jack Irish.Peter Temple is the author of nine novels, including four books in the Jack Irish series. He has won the Ned Kelly Award for Crime Fiction five times, and his widely acclaimed novels have been published in over twenty countries. The Broken Shore won the UK’s prestigious Duncan Lawrie Dagger for the best crime novel of 2007 and Truth won the 2010 Miles Franklin Literary Award.'The real wonder is why this wasn't bottled for export sooner...Whether they're drawn to twisty plots, atmospheric mysteries, taut suspense, wry humor, or all of the above, crime-fiction fans will want to spend time Down Under with Jack Irish.' Booklist 'Black Tide rips, snorts and crackles with a delicious pace.' Age'Gritty Melbourne atmosphere and lots of weather; a suitably alienated , macho anti-hero; a satisfying...mystery; and lots of Aussie Rules business. Confirms Temple's rep as the top hard-boiled crime writer on the local scene.' Courier-Mail'Black Tide is certainly compulsive, but Temple's laconic, utterly natural style and his instinctive command of the genre elevates it to a new level well above the standard...paranoia thriller. Temple is the business.' Australian Book Review'Hallelujah, Jack Irish - lawyer, punter, dyed-in-the-wool Fitzroy follower and part-time cabinetmaker - is back...a stunning and welcome return...A fast, funny, fabulous thriller.' Adelaide Advertiser

From the winner of the 2011 Ned Kelly Award for Best Crime Novel comes a cracking new Charlie Berlin mystery.It's September 1957, two days before the VFL grand final, and Detective Sergeant Charlie Berlin, former bomber pilot and ex-POW, finally has some time off. But there's no rest for Charlie, a decent but damaged man still troubled by his wartime experiences. A recently widowed friend asks a favour and he's dropped into something a hell of a lot bigger than he bargained for when he discovers a Melbourne funeral parlour has been burying bodies with parts missing. A Hungarian émigré hearse driver points Berlin in the right direction but it quickly becomes obvious anyone asking the wrong questions is in real danger.With his offsider beaten and left for dead, witnesses warned off, Special Branch on his case, and people he doesn't know watching his every move, Berlin realises even his young family may be in danger.His pursuit of the truth leads him to Blackwattle Creek, once an asylum for the criminally insane and now a foreboding home to even darker evils. And if Berlin thought government machinations during World War II were devious, those of the Cold War leave them for dead.Richly evocative of the period, Blackwattle Creek is a rattling good tale with a dry wit and a sobering core.

Imagine a place populated by criminals - people plucked from their lives, with their memories altered, who've been granted new identities and a second chance. Welcome to The Blinds, a dusty town in rural Texas populated by misfits who don't know if they've perpetrated a crime or just witnessed one. All they do know is that they opted into the programme and that if they try to leave, they will end up dead. For eight years, Sheriff Calvin Cooper has kept an uneasy peace - but after a suicide and a murder in quick succession, the town's residents revolt. Cooper has his own secrets to protect, so when his new deputy starts digging, he needs to keep one step ahead of her - and the mysterious outsiders who threaten to tear the whole place down.

From the moment he saw her, wrapped in a blanket at the hospital, Jesse knew that he'd be the one to look after his little sister, Rachel. Mum was always on the move and always bringing home trouble. When his mum's appetite for destruction leads the little family into the arms of Ray Crow, beneath the charm and charisma, Jesse sees the brooding violence and knows that, this time, the trouble is real. But Jesse is just a kid and even as he tries to save his sister, he makes a fatal error that exposes them to the kind of danger he has sworn to protect Rachel from. As their little world is torn to pieces, the children learn that, when you are lost and alone, the only thing you can trust is what's in your blood. Blood is an epic moral fable, a gothic odyssey set on the back roads of Australia. In understated prose touched with poetry, it finds tenderness in a world without sanctuary and the strength of innocence amidst violence and genuine evil.

One year after the death of his beloved musician father, thirteen-year-old Benny Oh begins to hear voices. The voices belong to the things in his house -- a sneaker, a broken Christmas ornament, a piece of wilted lettuce. Although Benny doesn't understand what these things are saying, he can sense their emotional tone; some are pleasant, a gentle hum or coo, but others are snide, angry and full of pain. When his mother develops a hoarding problem, the voices grow more clamorous. At first Benny tries to ignore them, but soon the voices follow him outside the house, onto the street and at school, driving him at last to seek refuge in the silence of a large public library, where objects are well-behaved and know to speak in whispers. There, he falls in love with a mesmerising street artist with a smug pet ferret, who uses the library as her performance space. He meets a homeless philosopher-poet, who encourages him to ask important questions and find his own voice amongst the many. And he meets his very own Book -- a talking thing -- who narrates Benny's life and teaches him to listen to the things that truly matter. The Book of Form and Emptiness blends unforgettable characters, riveting plot and vibrant engagement with everything from jazz to climate change to our attachment to material possessions. This is classic Ruth Ozeki -- bold, humane and heartbreaking.

As new ideas—and a new unrest—begin to sweep the Continent, a young Jew of mysterious origins arrives in a village in Poland. Visited by what seem to be ecstatic experiences, Jacob Frank casts a spell that attracts a fervent following. He reinvents himself again and again, converts to Islam, then Catholicism, is pilloried as a heretic, revered as the Messiah, and wreaks havoc on the conventional order, Jewish and Christian alike, with scandalous rumours of his sect’s secret rituals and the spread of his iconoclastic beliefs.The story of Frank—a real historical figure, a divisive yet charismatic man—is the perfect canvas for the genius and unparalleled reach of Olga Tokarczuk. Narrated through the perspectives of his contemporaries—those who revere him, those who revile him, the friend who betrays him, the lone woman who sees him for what he is—The Books of Jacob captures a world on the cusp of precipitous change, searching for certainty and longing for transcendence.Olga Tokarczuk is the winner of the 2018 Nobel Prize in Literature and the Man Booker International Prize, for her novel Flights. She has received many other honours, including her country Poland’s highest literary award, the Nike, for both Flights and The Books of Jacob, considered by many to be Tokarczuk's masterpiece. Her novel Drive Your Plow Over the Bones of the Dead was also highly praised. She is the author of nine novels, three story collections, a children’s book and two collections of essays, and has been translated into fifty languages. Widely regarded as the most important Polish writer of her generation, she lives in Poland.

With this historic win for ‘Bring Up the Bodies’, Hilary Mantel becomes the first British author and the first woman to be awarded two Man Booker Prizes (her first was for ‘Wolf Hall’ in 2009). By 1535 Thomas Cromwell is Chief Minister to Henry VIII, his fortunes having risen with those of Anne Boleyn, the king’s new wife. But Anne has failed to give the king an heir, and Cromwell watches as Henry falls for plain Jane Seymour. Cromwell must find a solution that will satisfy Henry, safeguard the nation and secure his own career. But neither minister nor king will emerge unscathed from the bloody theatre of Anne’s final days. ‘The greatest modern English prose writer working today’ Sir Peter Stothard, Chairman of the Man Booker Prize‘“Bring Up the Bodies” is simply exceptional… I envy anyone who hasn’t yet read it’ Sandra Parsons, Daily Mail‘A gripping story of tumbling fury and terror’ Philip Hensher, Independent on Sunday‘In another league. This ongoing story of Henry VIII’s right-hand man is the finest piece of historical fiction I have ever read. A staggering achievement’ Sarah Crompton, Sunday Telegraph‘Great novel – worthy companion to Wolf Hall … Hurry up with the third novel Hilary’ Daily Express