This is a list of historical events and publications of Australian literature during 2020.
Major publications
Literary fiction Patrick Allington – Rise & Shine Robbie Arnott – The Rain Heron James Bradley – Ghost Species Trent Dalton – All Our Shimmering Skies Jon Doust – Return Ticket Chris Flynn – Mammoth Anna Goldsworthy – Melting Moments Kate Grenville – A Room Made of Leaves Gail Jones – Our Shadows Tom Keneally – The Dickens Boy Sofie Laguna – Infinite Splendours Bem Le Hunte – Elephants with Headlights Carol Lefevre – Murmurations S. L. Lim – Revenge Amanda Lohrey – The Labyrinth Laura Jean McKay – The Animals in That Country Andrew Pippos – Lucky's Mirandi Riwoe – Stone Sky Gold Mountain Madeleine Ryan – A Room Called Earth Philip Salom – The Fifth Season Ronnie Scott – The Adversary Jock Serong – The Burning Island Craig Silvey – Honeybee Nardi Simpson – Song of the Crocodile Madeleine Watts – The Inland Sea Gina Wilkinson – When the Apricots Bloom Pip Williams – The Dictionary of Lost Words Daniel Davis Wood – At the Edge of the Solid World Evie Wyld – The Bass Rock
Short stories Melissa Manning – Smokehouse
Children's and young adult fiction Davina Bell – The End of the World is Bigger than Love Alex Dyson – When It Drops Alison Evans – Euphoria Kids Zana Fraillon – The Lost Soul Atlas Jane Godwin – When Rain Turns to Snow Kate Gordon – Aster's Good, Right Things Libby Hathorn and Lisa Hathorn-Jarman – No! Never! Will Kostakis Rebel Gods The Greatest Hit Anna McGregor – Anemone Is Not The Enemy Cath Moore – Metal Fish, Falling Snow Jaclyn Moriarty – The Stolen Prince of Cloudburst Sally Murphy – Worse Things Katrina Nannestad – We Are Wolves Garth Nix – The Left-Handed Booksellers of London Kirli Saunders – Bindi Shaun Tan – Dog Jessica Townsend – Hollowpox: The Hunt for Morrigan Crow
Crime Anne Buist – The Long Shadow Garry Disher – Consolation Candice Fox – Gathering Dark Sulari Gentill – A Testament of Character Jane Harper – The Survivors Sally Hepworth – The Good Sister Dervla McTiernan – The Good Turn J. P. Pomare – Tell Me Lies Michael Robotham – When She Was Good Sarah Thornton – White Throat David Whish-Wilson – True West
Science Fiction and Fantasy Max Barry – Providence Trudi Canavan – Maker's Curse Greg Egan – Instantiation Dennis Glover – Factory 19 Sam Hawke – Hollow Empire Gillian Polack – Poison & Light Paul Voermans – The White Library
Poetry Laurie Duggan – Homer Street Michael Farrell – Family Trees Kate Llewellyn – Harbour Felicity Plunkett – A Kinder Sea Ellen van Neerven Homeland Calling: Words from a new generation of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander voices (as editor) Throat
Non-fiction Julia Baird – Phosphorescence: On awe, wonder and things that sustain you when the world goes dark Richard Fidler – The Golden Maze: A History of Prague Michael Gawenda – The Powerbroker: Mark Leibler, an Australian Life Eddie Jaku – The Happiest Man on Earth John Kinsella – Displaced: A Rural Life Grace Karskens – People of the River: Lost worlds of early Australia Sophie McNeill – We Can't Say We Didn't Know: Dispatches from an age of impunity Brenda Niall – Friends and Rivals: Four Great Australian Writers: Barbara Baynton, Ethel Turner, Nettie Palmer, Henry Handel Richardson Caroline Overington – Missing William Tyrrell Christopher Pyne – The Insider: The scoops, the scandals and the serious business within the Canberra bubble Cassandra Pybus – Truganini: Journey Through the Apocalypse Miranda Tapsell – Top End Girl Robert Tickner – Ten Doors Down: The Story of an Extraordinary Adoption Reunion Malcolm Turnbull – A Bigger Picture
Awards and honours
Note: these awards were presented in the year in question.
Lifetime achievement
Award Author Mona Brand Award Kate Mulvany Patrick White Award Gregory Day
Literary
Award Author Title Publisher ALS Gold Medal Charmaine Papertalk Green Nganajungu Yagu Cordite Press Colin Roderick Award Sally Young Paper Emperors: The Rise of Australia’s Newspaper Empires NewSouth Publishing Indie Book Awards Book of the Year Favel Parrett There Was Still Love Hachette New South Wales Premier's Literary Awards Tara June Winch The Yield Penguin Random House Stella PrizeJess HillSee What You Made Me DoBlack Inc Victorian Premier's Literary Awards S. Shakthidharan, with Eamon Flack Counting and Cracking Belvoir and Co-Curious
Fiction
National
Award Author Title Publisher Adelaide Festival Awards for Literature Jessica Townsend Nevermoor: The Trials of Morrigan Crow Hachette ARA Historical Novel Prize Mirandi Riwoe Stone Sky Gold Mountain University of Queensland Press The Australian/Vogel Literary Award K. M. Kruimink A Treacherous Country Allen & Unwin Barbara Jefferis Award Lucy Treloar Wolfe Island Pan Macmillan Indie Book Awards Book of the Year – Fiction Favel Parrett There Was Still Love Hachette Indie Book Awards Book of the Year – Debut Fiction Suzanne Daniel Allegra in Three Parts Pan Macmillan Miles Franklin Literary Award Tara June Winch The Yield Penguin Random House Prime Minister's Literary Awards Tara June Winch The Yield Penguin Random House New South Wales Premier's Literary AwardsTara June WinchThe YieldPenguin Random House Queensland Literary Awards Mirandi Riwoe Stone Sky Gold Mountain University of Queensland Press Victorian Premier's Literary AwardsChristos TsiolkasDamascusAllen & Unwin Voss Literary Prize Tara June Winch The Yield Hamish Hamilton
Children and Young Adult National
Award Category Author Title PublisherChildren's Book of the Year Award Older Readers Vikki WakefieldThis Is How We Change the EndingText Publishing Younger ReadersPip HarryThe Little WaveUniversity of Queensland Press Picture BookChris McKimmieI Need a ParrotFord Street Early ChildhoodFrances WattsMy Friend FredAllen & UnwinEve Pownall Award for Information BooksBruce PascoeYoung Dark Emu: A truer historyMagabala BooksIndie Book Awards Book of the Year Children's Sami Bayly The Illustrated Encyclopaedia of Ugly Animals Lothian Young Adult Wal Chim The Surprising Power of a Good Dumpling Allen & UnwinNew South Wales Premier's Literary Awards Children'sLian Tanner & Jonathan BentleyElla and the OceanAllen & Unwin Young People'sKaren FoxleeLenny's Book of EverythingAllen & Unwin Victorian Premier's Literary Awards Young Adult FictionHelena FoxHow It Feels to Float Pan Macmillan Australia
Crime and Mystery
International
Award Category Author Title Publisher Barry Award Novel Jane Harper The Lost Man Pan Macmillan Crime Writers' Association Gold Dagger Award Novel Michael Robotham Good Girl, Bad Girl Hachette Australia
National
Award Category Author Title PublisherDavitt Award Novel Meg Mundell The Trespassers University of Queensland Press Young adult novel Astrid Scholte Four Dead Queens Allen & Unwin Children's novel Jenny Blackford The Girl in the Mirror Eagle Books True crime Adele Ferguson Banking Bad: Whistleblowers. Corporate cover-ups. One Journalist's Fight for the Truth HarperCollins Debut novel Susan Hurley Eight Lives Affirm PressReaders' choice Dervla McTiernan The Scholar HarperCollins Emma Viskic Darkness for Light Echo PublishingNed Kelly Award Novel Christian White The Wife and the Widow Affirm Press First novel Natalie Conyer Present Tense Clan Destine Press True crime Dan Box Bowraville Viking Books
Science fiction
Award Category Author Title PublisherDitmar Award NovelGillian PolackThe Year of the Fruit CakeIFWG Publishing Best Short FictionRivqa Rafael"Whom My Soul Loves"
Poetry
Award Author Title Publisher Adelaide Festival Awards for Literature Natalie Harkin Archival-Poetics Vagabond PressAnne Elder Award (joint winners)Cham Zhi Yiblur by theSubbed In Gareth Sion Jenkins Recipes for the Disaster Five Islands PressMary Gilmore Award Thom Sullivan Carte Blanche Vagabond PressPrime Minister's Literary Awards Omar Sakr The Lost Arabs University of Queensland Press New South Wales Premier's Literary AwardsPeter BoyleEnfolded in the Wings of a Great DarknessVagabond Press Queensland Literary Awards П. O. Heide Giramondo Publishing Victorian Premier's Literary AwardsCharmaine Papertalk GreenNganajungu YaguCordite
Drama
Award Category Author Title PublisherNew South Wales Premier's Literary Awards Script Kylie Boltin Missing Jacquelin Perske The Cry, Episode 2 Play S. Shakthidharan, with Eamon Flack Counting and Cracking Belvoir Victorian Premier's Literary Awards Drama S. Shakthidharan, with Eamon Flack Counting and Cracking BelvoirPatrick White Playwrights' Award Award Ra Chapman K-BOX Malthouse Theatre Fellowship Angus Cerini
Non-Fiction
Award Category Author Title Publisher Adelaide Festival Awards for Literature Non-Fiction Meredith Lake The Bible in Australia NewSouthIndie Book Awards Book of the Year Non-Fiction Archie Roach Tell Me Why Simon and Schuster Australia Illustrated Non-Fiction Paul Byrnes The Lost Boys Affirm Press National Biography AwardBiographyPatrick MullinsTiberius with a Telephone: The life and stories of William McMahonScribe PublicationsNew South Wales Premier's Literary Awards Non-FictionPatrick MullinsTiberius with a Telephone: The Life and Stories of William McMahonScribe PublicationsNew South Wales Premier's History Awards Australian History James DunkBedlam at Botany BayNewSouth Publishing Community and Regional History Callum Clayton-DixonSurviving New England: A History of Aboriginal Resistance and Resilience Through the First Forty Years of Colonial ApocalypseNēwara Aboriginal Corporation General HistoryKate FullagarThe Warrior, the Voyager, and the Artist: Three Lives in an Age of EmpireYale University Press Queensland Literary Awards Non-FictionJoe GormanHeartland: How Rugby League Explains QueenslandUniversity of Queensland Press Victorian Premier's Literary Awards Non-FictionChristina ThompsonSea People: The Puzzle of PolynesiaHarperCollins
Deaths
1 January – Alexander Frater, travel writer and journalist (born 1937 in Vanuatu) 6 January – Timoshenko Aslanides, poet (born 1943) 20 January – Steph Bowe, young adult novelist and blogger (born 1994) 1 April – Bruce Dawe, poet (born 1930) 14 May – Judith Clarke, writer for children and teenagers (born 1943) 5 June – Andrew Riemer, literary critic and author (born 1936) 10 June – Jesse Blackadder, novelist, screenwriter and journalist (born 1964) 7 July – Elizabeth Harrower, novelist (born 1928) 10 September – Barbara Ker Wilson, English-born Australian editor and novelist (born 1929) 29 September – Ania Walwicz, poet, playwright, prose writer and visual artist (born 1951 in Poland) 6 November – Gerald Stone, journalist (born 1933 in USA) 14 November – Greg Growden, sports journalist, author and biographer (born 1959/60) 9 December – Mungo MacCallum, political journalist and commentator (born 1941) 12 December – Wendy Brennan, romantic fiction writer (co-wrote with husband Frank Brennan as Emma Darcy) (born 1940)
See also 2020 in Australia 2020 in literature 2020 in poetry List of years in Australian literature List of years in literature List of Australian literary awards
References