Spike

Winner of the Scribe/CAL Fiction Prize announced

February 19 2010 — JA

Maris Morton was announced as the winner of the Scribe/CAL Fiction Prize last night at the newly opened Wheeler Centre.

Judges Kerryn Goldsworthy, Mark Rubbo, and Scribe acquisitions editor Aviva Tuffield selected Morton's novel A Darker Music ('a mystery that uncovers the buried secrets of a family who own a merino sheep station in Western Australia') from a pool of over 530 entrants, the eldest of whom was born in 1919, with 22 entrants born in the 1920s and 64 in the 1930s. Morton received a cash prize of $12 000 and a book contract from Scribe.

The other shortlisted manuscripts, Meg Mundell’s Black Glass and Jane Sullivan’s Little People were also highly commended and will be considered for publication. Congrats also to Spike guest blogger George Dunford for making the longlist, which you can read in full, here.

The prize, which was set up for writers over 35 to give an opportunity to emerging novelists outside the brackets of the Vogel, will run again next year, with entries opening in a couple of months. Keep an eye on the Scribe website for details.

Comments

Wow, fantastic. Can't wait to read the story. I (being on my way to 39) am very pleased to learn about this award. There's hope for we oldies yet! Well done to all the longlisters and the winners :)

Posted by Lily 19/02/10 at 12:25PM

why don't we all stop writing and just be quiet?

Posted by stopit 19/02/10 at 12:30PM

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