Miles Franklin Literary Award 2018 longlist announced

Wednesday, 23 May 2018 Books+Publishing

The longlist for the 2018 Miles Franklin Literary Award has been announced.

The 11 longlisted titles are:

A Long Way from Home (Peter Carey, Hamish Hamilton)
No More Boats (Felicity Castagna, Giramondo)
The Life to Come (Michelle de Kretser, A&U)
The Crying Place (Lia Hills, A&U)
The Last Garden (Eva Hornung, Text)
Some Tests (Wayne Macauley, Text)
Storyland (Catherine McKinnon, Fourth Estate)
Border Districts (Gerald Murnane, Giramondo)
From the Wreck (Jane Rawson, Transit Lounge)
The Restorer (Michael Sala, Text)
Taboo (Kim Scott, Picador).

A shortlist will be announced at the Australian Booksellers Association (ABA) conference in Canberra on 17 June and the winning author, who will receive $60,000, will be announced in August.

‘The longlist for the Miles Franklin Literary Award 2018 spans many genres of the novel: historical, fantastical, realist, satirical, allegorical and autobiographical,’ said State Librarian of NSW Mitchell librarian Richard Neville, speaking on behalf of the judging panel. ‘The books take us back in time to consider the effects of the past, or address the issues of contemporary life, or give glimpses of an uncertain, even frightening future.’

‘Whether dealing with disconnection, dispossession, the many varieties of grief and its resolutions, the violence done to those close or those unknown, or the deeper questions of existence, the eleven longlisted novels engage and reward the reader,’ said Neville.

The judging panel also includes journalist for the Australian Murray Waldren; book critic Melinda Harvey; Abbey’s Bookshop senior book buyer Lindy Jones; and Flinders University academic Susan Sheridan.

As previously reported by Books+Publishing, Josephine Wilson won the 2017 Miles Franklin Literary Award for her novel Extinctions (UWA Publishing).

Category: Awards Local news