Nib Award for Literature 2015

This year’s Nib Major Winners were presented with their prizes at an Awards Presentation hosted by Richard Glover on 25 November. The Nib is brought by the Waverley Library.

This year, The Waverely Library Award for Literature 2015 ($20 0000) prize goes to Acute Misfortune: The Life and Death of Adam Cullen by Erik Jensen. 

Erik Jensen

“It is an extraordinary honour to be given this award, and to follow the writers who have won it in the past. I am especially proud of the fact that this prize is for research. It is recognition of the kind of research journalists do every day: standing in front of a person, holding a notepad, and asking that they tell you the truth. Over four years of interviews, that is how this book was written. It wasn’t the kind of scholarly work that produces most biographies – I had thought I would do that, write that kind of book, but I turned out to be very wrong. Still, it ended up being the only way to get even close to understanding Adam” said the Author

The Nib Anzac Centenary Prize for Literature

This year, in commemorating the centenary of The Great War, they offered a special prize, The Nib Anzac Centenary Literary Prize, which was generously sponsored by Bondi Junction, North Bondi and Rose Bay RSL Sub Branches.

Congratulations once again to all the finalists in this one off commemorative prize for 2015. They were four, starting with The Secrets of the Anzacs by Raden Dunbar, Seasons of War by Christopher Lee, One Minute’s Silence by David Metzenthen & Michael Camilleri, Bearing Witness by Peter Rees.

Peter Rees

The Nib Anzac Centenary Prize for Literature ($3000) goes to Peter Rees and his book Bearing Witness.

“In a year that has seen Australians reflect on the contribution of our men and women in the Great War 100 years ago, I feel honoured to be awarded the Anzac Literary Prize for my biography of Charles Bean. It was Bean who recorded their deeds both as the official correspondent and then as the official historian and as such, has a unique place in the nation’s history. I set out to capture not just his remarkable feat, but to understand the impact that four years at the front had on him at a very personal level. I think that in his own quiet way, Charles Bean would be pleased that such a prize reminds a new generation of Australians of both the achievements and sacrifices that these men and women made” said the Anzac Prize winner.

People’s Choice Prize 2015

Mark Dapin won the People’s Choice Prize 2015 with The Nashos’ War.

Mark Dapin

A record number of votes were received from around the country for this year’s People’s Choice Prize in what became very close competition.

“I am very, very happy to win the People’s Choice Award for The Nashos’ War – which, ironically, is a book about the choices people made many years ago, regarding national service and the Vietnam War. It’s humbling to think that so many readers considered my book sufficiently important to spend their own time to write and advocate for it. I’m especially pleased to see that many of the supportive comments came from former-nachos themselves” Mark said.

Congratulations again to all the 2015 Nib Award finalists, recipients of the Alex Buzo Shortlist Prize for 2015 : The Director is the Commander by Anna Broinowski, John Olsen by Darleen Bungey, Warning: The Story of Cyclone Tracy by Sophie Cunningham, Acute Misfortune: The Life and Death of Adam Cullen by Erik Jensen, Blood & Guts: Dispatches from the Whale Wars by Sam Vincent.

People’s Choice Community winners

Martin Wilksof Tamarama and Terry Flynn of Willawarrin who both voted in the People’s Choice Prize and supported the overall People’s Choice Winner Mark Dapin, winning themselves a wonderful prize pack each.

Martin Wilksof Tamarama with Fiona Trick

This year’s People’s Choice Prize was again awarded with the generous support of catorgory major sponsor, Mark Moran Vaucluse.

The Judges

The Nib Awards are judged by an independent panel of three judges.

Jamie Grant is the lead judge. He is the author of nine collections of poetry and has published 100s of others in anthologies and literary journals. His most recent works include 100 Australian Poems You Need to Know; 100 Australian Poems of Love and Loss & Glass on the Chimney. His commitment to and involvement with The Nib over many years have brought much credit, respect and authority to the award and the judging process. He was also a judge for this year’s Prime Ministers Literary Awards.

Katerina Cosgrove is an author, writer and former judge for the NSW Premier’s Literary Awards. She was a Nib judge last year and previously taught Writing at the University of Technology. Katerina is the author of two novels, The Glass Heart and Bone Ash Sky. Her work, Intimate Distance, was a winner of the Griffith Review/CAL Novella Prize in 2012, subsequently published by Text. Her eco-dystopian story, Salt, Sugar Sea was chosen from 400+ entries for The Big Issue fiction edition in 2014. She has also written for The Age, The Australian and Australian Author.

Catherine Jinks writes fiction for all age groups. With more than 40 works to her credit, she is a four-time winner of the Children’s Book Council of Australia Book of the Year award, and has also won a Victorian Premier’s Literature Award, the Adelaide Festival Award for Literature, the Ena Noel Award for Children’s Literature and an Aurealis Award for Science Fiction. In 2001 she was presented with a Centenary Medal for her contribution to Australian Children’s literature. Catherine was shortlisted for The Nib in 2008 for The Dark Mountain; this is her first year as a Nib judge.
Other Award and Prize News

CBCA NSW Aspiring Writers’ Mentorship Program – sponsored by Penguin, this annual award presented by The Children’s Book Council of Australia NSW, has been won by Derina McLaughlin for her story, The Brumby of Summerhill Park.

Dromkeen Medal – Andy Griffiths is the 2015 winner. He is the author of 28 books including the enormously popular Treehouse series which he created with long-time collaborators Jill Griffiths and Terry Denton.

Patrick White Literary Award – this award, has been won by Joan London. Joan is the author of three collections of short stories and three novels.

Richell Prize for Emerging Writers – this inaugural prize has been won by Sally Abbott for her entry Closing Down, about a future Australia ‘negotiating a tidal wave of refugees’. Sally receives $10,000 from Hachette Australia and a year’s mentoring with publisher Robert Watkins.

Melbourne Prize for Literature – Poet Chris Wallace-Crabbe has been announced as the winner of the $60,000 Prize for 2015, beating a competitive shortlist of Steven Carroll, Brenda Niall, Chris Tsiolkas and Alexis Wright. Andrea Goldsmith was awarded the $30,000 Best Writing Award for her novel, The Memory Trap. The Nib Winner Helen Garner won the prize in 2006.