Text Prize 2015 shortlist announced

19 May 2015 Books+Publishing

The shortlist for the 2015 Text Prize for Young Adult and Children’s Writing has been announced.

The shortlisted authors and their manuscripts are:

Margot McGovern for Neverland, ‘an ambitious, complex story about memory, growing up and moving on,’ which follows 17-year-old narrator Kit Learmonth who ‘would rather die than grow up and leave her family’s island’.
Sophie Overett for Agatha Abel Meets her Maker, ‘a compelling, modern exploration of adolescent sexuality and the emotional life of teenagers’, set in an all-girls Catholic boarding school.
Mark Russell for Solstice, ‘an exciting, adventurous and original work of science fiction’ that is ‘set on a planet that stopped rotating generations ago where half the world lives in shadow, half in light’.
Kimberley Starr for The Book of Whispers, ‘an imaginative and gripping historical fantasy novel set during the first Crusade, in a world where demons are real’.

More information on the shortlisted manuscripts and authors is available here.

The winner of this year’s prize will be announced at an event in Melbourne on 28 May.

Text received 268 entries for this year’s prize, up from 253 last year.

The Text Prize for an unpublished manuscript by an Australian or New Zealand writer is now in its eighth year. The winner receives a publishing contract with Text and a $10,000 advance against royalties.

Text will release last year’s winning entry, David Burton’s memoir How to be Happy, on 26 August.

Category: Local news