Exciting news! The Victorian Premier’s Literary Awards 2024 shortlist has just been announced. The Victorian Premier’s Literary Awards were inaugurated by the Victorian Government in 1985 to honour literary achievement by Australian writers. The awards are administered by the Wheeler Centre on behalf of the Premier of Victoria.

★ Prize for Fiction

• But the Girl by Jessica Zhan Mei Yu
• Edenglassie by Melissa Lucashenko
• Only Sound Remains by Hossein Asgari
• Serengotti by Eugen Bacon
• Stone Yard Devotional by Charlotte Wood
• Wall by Jen Craig

Highly commended: Burn by Melanie Saward, Paradise Estate by Max Easton and Southern Aurora by Mark Brandi

★ Prize for Non-fiction

• Cruel Care: A History of Children at Our Borders by Jordana Silverstein
• Fat Girl Dancing by Kris Kneen
• Flawed Hero: Truth, Lies and War Crimes by Chris Masters
• Killing for Country: A Family Story by David Marr
• Personal Score: Sport, Culture, Identity by Ellen van Neerven
• The Palestine Laboratory by Antony Loewenstein

★ Prize for Indigenous Writing

• Close to the Subject: Selected Works by Daniel Browning
• Firelight: Stories by John Morrissey
• Personal Score: Sport, Culture, Identity by Ellen van Neerven

Highly commended: Dirrarn by Carl Merrison & Hakea Hustler and Etta and the Shadow Taboo by J.M. Field & Jeremy Worrall (illus.)

★ Prize for Poetry

• Chinese Fish by Grace Yee
• Kangaroo Paw by Claire Miranda Roberts
• the body country by Susie Anderson

★ Prize for Children's Literature

• Ghost Book by Remy Lai
• It's the Sound of the Thing by Maxine Beneba Clarke
• Who's Afraid of the Light by Anna McGregor

Highly commended: Australia: Country of Colour by Jess Racklyeft and The Goodbye Year by Emily Gale

★ Prize for Writing for Young Adults

• A Hunger of Thorns by Lili Wilkinson
• The Quiet and the Loud by Helena Fox
• We Could Be Something by Will Kostakis

Highly commended: We Didn't Think It Through by Gary Lonesborough

★ Prize for an Unpublished Manuscript

• Garbage by Hayley Elliott-Ryan
• Laughing River by N.J. Madden
• Panajachel by Rachel Morton

★ Prize for Drama

• Jacky by Declan Furber Gillick
• Loaded by Christos Tsiolkas & Dan Giovannoni
• The Jungle and the Sea by S. Shakthidharan & Eamon Flack

The winners of the main suite of awards – fiction, nonfiction, drama, poetry, writing for young adults and the prize for Indigenous writing – each receive $25,000. The winner of the Prize for an Unpublished Manuscript receives $15,000. The category winners will be announced early next year, and will go on to contest the overall Victorian Prize for Literature, worth an additional $100,000. The winners will be announced on Thursday 1st February 2024. Visit the Wheeler Centre website for more information.