Varuna announces 2025 residential fellowships

Varuna, the National Writers’ House has announced the recipients of its residential fellowships for 2025, including eight flagship fellowship recipients.

The writers and their projects are:

Eleanor Dark flagship fellowship

• Sarah Kanake for her literary fiction work ‘Lazarus: or, The Whale’

Eric Dark flagship fellowship

• Suri Matondkar for her essay collection ‘Tongue’

Henry Handel Richardson flagship fellowship

• Claire Aman for her short story collection ‘Felt’

First Nations flagship fellowship

• Melanie Saward for her memoir ‘With the Feathers’

Mick Dark flagship fellowship

• Mia-Francesca Jones for her narrative nonfiction ‘Somehow North’

Jerra flagship fellowship

• Alexandra McCallum for her poetry collection ‘Shaking the Dreamland Tree’

Poetry flagship fellowship

• Natalie Rathswohl for her poetry collection ‘Language Lessons’

Ray Koppe young writers’ flagship fellowship

• Emma Clancey for the crime fiction ‘Bad Medicine’

Residential fellowships

• Andrew Brooks for his poetry collection ‘Year of the Ox’
• Aneil Fatania for his historical fiction ‘English-English’
• Bernadette Green for her children’s book ‘Ellie Needs a Dog’
• Charlotte Guest for her literary fiction work ‘The Kookaburra’
• Claire Christian for her YA fiction ‘The Invisibles’
• Claudia Lyons for her crime fiction ‘Thank You for Your Patience’
• D Frederick Thomas for their literary fiction work ‘Novel Written on My Phone’
• Danial Yazdani for his play ‘Exile and Return’
• Deborah Wardle for her literary fiction work ‘Why We Cry’
• Denise Young for her biography ‘Checkmate’
• Eartha Davis for her poetry collection ‘màthair beinn’
• Ellie Nielsen for her play ‘Vertigo’
• Emma Warrender for her popular fiction ‘REDLINE’
• Gemma Parker for her memoir ‘Moon Overhead, Nothing Moving’
• Hollen Singleton for their fantasy or speculative fiction work ‘Moss House’
• Jack Brosnan for his literary fiction work ‘Sky Half Empty’
• Jade Reilly for her crime fiction ‘Signs of Life’
• Jessie Cole for her literary fiction work ‘BEAR’
• Kristy Fairlamb for her popular fiction ‘Lying Hearts’
• Liana Skrzypczak for her YA fiction ‘Lore of Gon’
• Lynette Diamant for her children’s book ‘Crowlea’
• Maria van Neerven for her poetry collection ‘To give them a voice’
• Mary Colussi for her fantasy or speculative fiction work ‘Touch Grass’
• Nicole Hayes for her YA fiction ‘The Sundry: Book 1 of the Fertility Trials’
• Rachael Mead for her historical fiction ‘The Amazoniad’
• Renay Pepita for her poetry collection ‘Philotes and Eris’
• Ruairi Murphy for his fantasy/speculative fiction work ‘The i’s are an open wound’
• Sam Elkin for his memoir ‘Pit Pony’
• Tina Nyfakos for her literary fiction work ‘Galagoo’.

Varuna received 505 submissions from writers at all stages of their writing careers. Varuna also released a list of 38 highly commended writers and their projects on its website.

The Varuna peer assessors were Mary Anne Butler, Ali Cobby Eckermann, Roanna Gonsalves, James Jiang, Kris Kneen, Cheryl Leavy, Shaun Prescott, Beejay Silcox and Greg Woodland.

Category: Awards Local news