The 2012 NSW Premier's Literary and History Awards
We are absolutely delighted to announce that the following Allen & Unwin authors have been shortlisted in the 2012 NSW Premier's Literary and History Awards!
The Awards are an important and integral part of the State's cultural activity and are worth over $350,000.
The Awards are managed by the State Library of NSW, in association with Arts NSW, and winners will be revealed in a ceremony on 30 November in the historic Mitchell Library Reading Room.
The Christina Stead Prize
Spotlight:
by Malcolm Knox
He looked into the Pacific and the Pacific looked back into him.
The Life tells the story of former-world-champion Australian surfer, Dennis Keith, from inside the very heart of the fame and madness that is 'The Life'.
Spotlight:
by Rohan Wilson
A surprisingly beautiful evocation of horror and brutality - a meditation on the intricacies of human nature at its most raw. Winner of the 2011 The Australian/Vogel's Literary Award.
UTS Glenda Adams Award for New Writing
Spotlight:
by Rohan Wilson
1829, Tasmania
John Batman, ruthless, singleminded; four convicts, the youngest still only a stripling; Gould, a downtrodden farmhand; two free black trackers; and powerful, educated Black Bill, brought up from childhood as a white man. This is the roving party and their purpose is massacre.
The Douglas Stewart Prize
Spotlight:
by Martin Thomas
A timely and important re-evaluation of a pioneer in anthropology and Aboriginal studies: meticulously researched, beautifully written and convincingly argued.
The Patricia Wrightson Prize
Spotlight:
by Kate Constable
A gripping time-slip adventure, in the tradition of Ruth Park's classic Playing Beatie Bow.
The Ethel Turner Prize
Spotlight:
by Bill Condon
A funny, poignant, heartwarming story of first love, first job, friends, family and the inevitability of change in the first summer out of school.
Spotlight:
by Ursula Dubosarsky
There were only eleven of them, like eleven sisters all the same age in a large family. Because it was such a very small class, they had a very small classroom, which was perched at the very top of the school - up four flights of stairs, up in the high sky, like a colony of little birds nesting on a cliff. 'Today, girls,' said Miss Renshaw, 'we shall go out into the beautiful Gardens and think about death.'
Spotlight:
by Scot Gardner
Aaron Rowe has dreams he can't explain, and memories he can't recover. But if he doesn't discover the truth about his hidden past soon, he may fall asleep one night and never wake up. A potent, intense, psychodrama that will keep you gripped to the very last page.
Spotlight:
by Penni Russon
Does the world shape us, or do we shape the world? A suspenseful story of parallel realities - two girls in two worlds with two different ways to survive. 'Fascinating and absolutely memorable.' - Ursula Dubosarsky
The Community Relations Commission for a Multicultural NSW Award
Spotlight:
by Tim Bonyhady
From high society in Vienna to a small flat in Sydney; from patrons of the arts to refugees from the Holocaust; this is the enthralling story of three generations of women spanning a century of upheaval.
The General History Prize
Spotlight:
by Tim Bonyhady
'Wonderful. A haunting saga of high art, hate and survival.' - David Marr
'An enthralling family history beginning in an opulent apartment in Habsburg Vienna and ending in a flat in Cremorne, interwoven with the social, political and art history of the period.' - Patrick McCaughey
Young People's History Prize
Spotlight:
by Anh Do and Suzanne Do, illustrated by Bruce Whatley
Anh Do's inspirational story about his family's incredible escape from war-torn Vietnam and his childhood in Australia, told especially for children.
Spotlight:
by Compiled by Nadia Wheatley, illustrated by Ken Searle
We use the bush as our school and as our playground, says one of the many Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people whose voices combine in this anthology of true stories about childhood, compiled from a wide range of memoirs and oral histories.