Victorian Premier’s Literary Awards 2024
Your definitive guide to Australia’s best writing. Learn more about the shortlisted and highly commended works.
Click on the books below for further information
2024 WINNERS
People’s Choice Award
The Palestine Laboratory: How
Israel exports the technology
of occupation around the world
Antony Loewenstein
FICTION
But the Girl
Jessica Zhan Mei Yu
Hamish Hamilton
Edenglassie
Melissa Lucashenko
University of Queensland Press
Only Sound Remains
Hossein Asgari
Puncher & Wattmann
Serengotti
Eugen Bacon
Transit Lounge
Stone Yard Devotional
Charlotte Wood
Allen & Unwin
Wall
Jen Craig
Puncher & Wattmann
Highly Commended
Burn
Melanie Saward
Affirm Press
Paradise Estate
Max Easton
Giramondo Publishing
Southern Aurora
Mark Brandi
Hachette Australia
NON-FICTION
Cruel Care: A History of
Children at Our Borders
Jordana Silverstein
Monash University Publishing
Fat Girl Dancing
Kris Kneen
Text Publishing
Flawed Hero: Truth, lies and
war crimes
Chris Masters
Allen & Unwin
Killing for Country: A Family
Story
David Marr
Black Inc.
Personal Score: Sport,
culture, identity
Ellen van Neerven
University of Queensland
Press
The Palestine Laboratory:
How Israel exports the
technology of occupation
around the world
Antony Loewenstein
Scribe Publications
INDIGENOUS WRITING
Close to the Subject: Selected
Works
Daniel Browning
Magabala Books
Firelight
John Morrissey
Text Publishing
Personal Score: Sport,
culture, identity
Ellen van Neerven
University of Queensland
Press
Highly Commended
Dirrarn
Carl Merrison, Hakea Hustler
Magabala Books
Etta
JM Field, Jeremy Worrall
Hardie Grant Children’s Publishing
CHILDREN'S LITERATURE
Ghost Book
Remy Lai
Allen & Unwin
It’s the Sound of the Thing:
100 new poems for young
people
Maxine Beneba Clarke
Hardie Grant Children’s
Publishing
Who’s Afraid of the Light?
Anna McGregor
Scribble
Highly Commended
Australia: Country of Colour
Jess Racklyeft
Affirm Press
The Goodbye Year
Emily Gale
Text Publishing
DRAMA
Jacky
Declan Furber Gillick
Currency Press & Melbourne
Theatre Company
Loaded
Christos Tsiolkas & Dan
Giovannoni
Adapted by Christos Tsiolkas
and Dan Giovannoni, from the
novel by Christos Tsiolkas
Loaded was originally
commissioned by Malthouse Theatre
The Jungle and the Sea
S. Shakthidharan & Eamon
Flack
Belvoir St Theatre & Currency
Press
Highly Commended
Nosferatu
Keziah Warner
Nosferatu was originally commissioned
by Malthouse Theatre and first published
by Currency Press
Telethon Kid
Alistair Baldwin
Telethon Kid was originally commissioned
by Malthouse Theatre
The Dictionary of Lost Words
Verity Laughton
State Theatre Company
South Australia
POETRY
Chinese Fish
Grace Yee
Giramondo Publishing
Kangaroo Paw
Claire Miranda Roberts
Vagabond Press
the body country
Susie Anderson
Hachette Australia
WRITING FOR YOUNG ADULTS
A Hunger of Thorns
Lili Wilkinson
Allen & Unwin
The Quiet and the Loud
Helena Fox
Pan Australia
We Could Be Something
Will Kostakis
Allen & Unwin
Highly Commended
We Didn’t Think It Through
Gary Lonesborough
Allen & Unwin
UNPUBLISHED MANUSCRIPT
Garbage
Hayley Elliott-Ryan
Laughing River
N. J. Madden
Panajachel
Rachel Morton
Fiction
Paddy O’Reilly, Ellen Cregan, Pirooz Jafari, Odette Kelada (convenor)
Non-Fiction
Rosemary Cameron, Shakira Hussein, Esther Anatolitis, Mahmood Fazal, Sian Prior (convenor)
Indigenous Writing
Maya Hodge, Tristen Harwood, Jeanine Leane (convenor)
Drama
Petra Kalive, Jean Tong, Richard Watts (convenor)
Poetry
Samah Sabawi, Prithvi Varatharajan (convenor)
Writing for Young Adults
Angela Crocombe, Alice Boyle, Cath Moore (convenor)
Unpublished Manuscript
Hasib Hourani, Adalya Nash Hussein, Allee Richards (convenor)
Photography by Sarah Walker (main image and Unpublished Manuscripts)
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.
The 2024 Victorian Premier’s Literary Awards ceremony is presented with the support of Fed Square.
The Wheeler Centre acknowledges the Wurundjeri Woi Wurrung people of the Kulin Nation as the Traditional Owners of the land on which the Centre stands. We acknowledge and pay our respects to all Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples and their Elders, past and present, as the custodians of the world’s oldest continuous living culture.