Controversial Beast Wins Queensland YA Literary Prize

17th September- Matt Ottley's (right) Requiem for a Beast, 'naughty' words content, caused a bit of a stir when it won an Australian Children's Book Council Award Older Readers Award a few weeks back. The august body was forced to defend it's decision publicly: a rare ripple in it's generally conservative pond.

The controversy certainly helped the Beast's profile. Now, even better sales should be guaranteed, following it's $15,000 win in the Young Adult category of Queensland Premiers Literary Prizes. The 'politically correct' brigade in the Sunshine State will no doubt break from making pumpkin scones and possibly form an alliance with the the 'morally' outraged elsewhere throughout the country to 'burn the book'- ah tolerance.

Our local library is obviously not too bothered as it was available on the 'New Arrivals' shelf to-day. The 'Tragic' is looking forward to curling-up with a wee malt later on this evening to having a 'squizz' to see what all the fuss is about.

Melbourne author, Helen Garner (left), won the $25,000 Fiction award for The Spare Room, already a winner of a $30,000 Victorian Premier's prize. Some locals were surprised that the Brisbane Courier Mail journo', Matthew Condon's, The Trout Opera (previously short listed for arguably what used to be Australia's leading award, the Miles Franklin) didn't get the prize - at least according to the Courier Mail report.

Garner's book, her first published work for many a long year, has also attracted a degree of acrimony in some quarters from those who believe the work of 'fiction', is not fiction at all as it is apparently loosely based on Garner's own life experience. Now, that is a challenge don't ya think? Where does fiction and real life actually separate? Spending a great deal of time ensconced in his own literary cyber-fantasy world, the Tragic is hardly qualified to comment. That said, if there is a single fiction author whose characters or story lines have not been informed by their own socially constructed realities then the Tragic could well have been JS Bach and the real Shakespeare as he so often claims....

For followers of Kidslit, the winner of the Children's Book award, The Peasant Prince, by Li Cunxin and Anne Spudvilas is gorgeous. It has picked-up a number of awards in Australia and deserves a wider audience. (Perhaps it already has?)

All in all a generous $225,000 of Queensland tax payers treasury contributions were dispersed to 14 category winners: it's a golden age for literary prizes in the land of OZ. Thank God the economy is sound, he typed, as another stock broker flew past the window on the tenth floor.....

Whilst the winners of the Queensland Premier's prize generally get little recognition outside the Great South Lands, where Book Tragic resides these days, the quality is usually pretty good. A nice aspect of the awards is their breadth, covering a range of categories that seldom get a look-in in literary award world. For the record the winners were: (full book details who need the whole banana can be found at Literary Awards Australia)

Fiction Award Winner:
Title: The Spare Room
Author: Helen Garner

Non Fiction Book Award
Title: Muck
Author: Craig Sherborne

Young Adult Book Award
Title: Requiem for a Beast
Author: Matt Ottley

Children's Book: The Peasant Prince, by Li Cunxin and Anne Spudvilas.

Science Writer Award: Why is Uranus Upside Down? And other questions about the Universe, by Professor Fred Watson;

Literary or Media Work Advancing Public Debate: 'In My Shoes', by Quentin McDermott and Steve Taylor, screened on ABC television's Four Corners;

Film Script – Pacific Film & Television Commission Award: 'Prime Mover', by David Caesar;

Drama Script (Stage) Award: 'When the Rain Stops Fallin', by Andrew Bovell;

Television Script – QUT Creative Industries Award: 'Underbelly, Episode 7', by Felicity Packard;

History Book: Drawing the Global Colour Line, by Marilyn Lake and Henry Reynolds;

Poetry Collection: Typewriter Music, by David Malouf; (details)

Australian Short Story: "Someone Else", by John Hughes;

Emerging Queensland Author: Omega Park, by Amy Vought Barker;

Unpublished Indigenous Writer: Every Secret Thing, by Marie Munkara;