Silcox wins inaugural KYD Flash Fiction Prize

Kill Your Darlings (KYD) has announced Beejay Silcox as the inaugural winner of the KYD Flash Fiction Prize, for her story ‘‘Mefloquine’.

As the winner, Silcox receives $1000. ‘Mefloquine’ has been published in KYD.

Silcox is a writer and book critic, and she was previously the artistic director of the Canberra Writers Festival. In addition to her literary commentary, she also works as an interviewer, prize judge, festival programmer, editor and educator.

KYD publishing director and CEO Rebecca Starford said, ‘Formally intriguing, confident, evocative, Beejay Silcox’s “Mefloquine” does everything we hoped for in the prize – to surprise, to entertain, to trouble. In just a few short pages, she captures perfectly a woman fragmenting. I could not stop thinking about this story.’

Three runners-up were also announced: Linda Atkins for ‘After’, Tui Rose Butler for ‘Wake Up Call’, and Isabella Trimboli for ‘The Spoiled Cassata’. These three writers will each receive $500, and their stories will also be published in KYD this year.

The inaugural KYD Flash Fiction Prize received 290 entries from around Australia. KYD said the new prize was ‘designed to challenge writers to be faster, punchier and more focused in their storytelling’. Starford previously said KYD intends for the prize to be run annually.

More information about the prize is available on the KYD website.

Category: Awards Local news