# 2017 in Australian literature

This article presents a list of the historical events and publications of Australian literature during 2017.

## Major publications
### Literary fiction

* Peter Carey – A Long Way from Home
* Felicity Castagna – No More Boats
* J. M. Coetzee – The Schooldays of Jesus
* Michelle de Kretser – The Life to Come
* Robert Drewe – Whipbird
* Richard Flanagan – First Person
* Eva Hornung – The Last Garden
* Sofie Laguna – The Choke
* Alex Miller – The Passage of Love
* Gerald Murnane – Border Districts
* Bram Presser – The Book of Dirt
* Kim Scott – Taboo

### Children's and Young Adult fiction

* Judith Clarke – My Lovely Frankie
* Zana Fraillon – The Ones That Disappeared
* Morris Gleitzman – Maybe
* Andy Griffiths
** The Tree House Fun Book 2
** The 91-Storey Treehouse
* Jessica Townsend – Nevermoor: The Trials of Morrigan Crow

### Crime

* Sarah Bailey — The Dark Lake
* Alan Carter — Marlborough Man
* Peter Corris — Win, Lose or Draw
* Garry Disher — Under the Cold Bright Lights
* Sulari Gentill — Crossing the Lines
* Anna George — The Lone Child
* Jane Harper – Force of Nature
* Wendy James – The Golden Child
* Adrian McKinty — Police at the Station and They Don't Look Friendly
* Michael Robotham — The Secrets She Keeps
* Iain Ryan — The Student
* Sarah Schmidt — See What I Have Done
* Ann Turner — Out of the Ice

### Science Fiction, Fantasy and Speculative fiction

* Claire G. Coleman – Terra Nullius
* Thoraiya Dyer – Crossroads of Canopy
* Greg Egan – "Uncanny Valley"
* Ian Irvine – The Fatal Gate
* Catherine McKinnon – Storyland
* Jane Rawson – From the Wreck
* Angela Slatter – Corpselight
* Cat Sparks – Lotus Blue

### Poetry

* Michael Farrell – I Love Poetry
* Bella Li – Argosy
* Jennifer Maiden – The Metronome
* Alan Wearne – These Things Are Real
* Fiona Wright – Domestic Interior

### Drama

* Tommy Murphy – Mark Colvin's Kidney

### Biographies

* Judith Brett — The Enigmatic Mr Deakin
* Brentley Frazer – Scoundrel Days: A Memoir
* Sarah Krasnostein – The Trauma Cleaner

### Non-fiction

* Peter FitzSimons – Burke and Wills: The Triumph and Tragedy of Australia's Most Famous Explorers
* Kate Grenville – The Case Against Fragrance
* John Safran – Depends What You Mean by Extremist
* Alexis Wright – Tracker

## Awards and honours

Note: these awards were presented in the year in question.

### Lifetime achievement

| Award | Author |
| Patrick White Award | Tony Birch |

### Literary

| Award | Author | Title | Publisher |
| ALS Gold Medal | Zoe Morrison | Music and Freedom | Random House |
| Colin Roderick Award | Josephine Wilson | Extinctions | UWA Publishing |
| Indie Book Awards Book of the Year | Jane Harper | The Dry | Macmillan |
| Nita Kibble Literary Award | Not awarded | | |
| Stella Prize | Heather Rose | The Museum of Modern Love | Allen & Unwin |
| Victorian Prize for Literature | Leah Purcell | The Drover's Wife | Currency Press |

### Fiction
#### National

| Award | Author | Title | Publisher |
| Adelaide Festival Awards for Literature | Not awarded | | |
| The Australian/Vogel Literary Award | Marija Peričić | The Lost Pages | Allen & Unwin |
| Barbara Jefferis Award | Not awarded | | |
| Indie Book Awards Book of the Year – Fiction | Dominic Smith | The Last Painting of Sara de Vos | Sarah Crichton Books |
| Indie Book Awards Book of the Year – Debut Fiction | Jane Harper | The Dry | Macmillan |
| Miles Franklin Award | Josephine Wilson | Extinctions | UWA Publishing |
| Prime Minister's Literary Awards | Ryan O'Neill | Their Brilliant Careers | Black Inc |
| New South Wales Premier's Literary Awards | Heather Rose | The Museum of Modern Love | Allen & Unwin |
| Queensland Literary Awards | Melissa Ashley | The Birdman’s Wife | Affirm Press |
| Victorian Premier's Literary Award | Georgia Blain | Between a Wolf and a Dog | Scribe |

### Children and Young Adult
#### National

| Award | Category | Author | Title | Publisher |
| Children's Book of the Year Award | Older Readers | Claire Zorn | One Would Think the Deep | UQP |
| Children's Book of the Year Award | Younger Readers | Trace Balla | Rockhopping | Allen & Unwin |
| Children's Book of the Year Award | Picture Book | Bob Graham | Home in the Rain | Walker Books |
| Children's Book of the Year Award | Early Childhood | Johanna Bell, illus. Dion Beasley | Go Home, Cheeky Animals! | Allen & Unwin |
| Indie Book Awards Book of the Year | Children's | Jeannie Baker | Circle | Walker Books |
| Indie Book Awards Book of the Year | Young Adult | Cath Crowley | Words in Deep Blue | Pan MacMillan |
| New South Wales Premier's Literary Awards | Children's | Leanne Hall | Iris and the Tiger | Text Publishing |
| New South Wales Premier's Literary Awards | Young People's | James Roy and Noël Zihabamwe | One Thousand Hills | Omnibus Books, Scholastic Australia |
| Victorian Premier's Literary Award | Young Adult Fiction | Randa Abdel-Fattah | When Michael Met Mina | Pan Australia |

### Crime and Mystery
#### International

| Award | Author | Title | Publisher |
| CWA Gold Dagger Award | Jane Harper | The Dry | Macmillan Publishers |

#### National

| Award | Category | Author | Title | Publisher |
| Davitt Award | Novel | Jane Harper | The Dry | Macmillan Publishers |
| Davitt Award | Young adult novel | Shivaun Plozza | Frankie | Penguin |
| Davitt Award | Children's novel | Judith Rossell | Wormwood Mire: A Stella Montgomery Intrigue | HarperCollins |
| Davitt Award | True crime | Megan Norris | Look What You Made Me Do: Fathers Who Kill | Big Sky Publishing |
| Davitt Award | Debut novel | Cath Ferla | Ghost Girls | Echo Publishing |
| Davitt Award | Readers' choice | Jane Harper | The Dry | Macmillan Publishers |
| Ned Kelly Award | Novel | Adrian McKinty | Police at the Station and They Don't Look Friendly | Seventh Street Books |
| Ned Kelly Award | First novel | Jane Harper | The Dry | Macmillan Publishers |
| Ned Kelly Award | True crime | Duncan McNab | Getting Away With Murder | Random House |
| Ned Kelly Award | True crime | Brendan James Murray | The Drowned Man | Echo Publishing |
| Ned Kelly Award | Lifetime achievement | Not awarded | | |

### Science fiction

| Award | Category | Author | Title | Publisher |
| Aurealis Award | Sf Novel | Jane Rawson | From the Wreck | Transit Lounge |
| Aurealis Award | Sf Short Story | Garth Nix | "Conversations with an Armoury" | Solaris (Infinity Wars) |
| Aurealis Award | Fantasy Novel | Jay Kristoff | Godsgrave | HarperCollins Publishers |
| Aurealis Award | Fantasy Short Story | Tansy Rayner Roberts | "The Curse is Come Upon Me, Cried" | Please Look After This Angel & Other Winged Stories (self-published) |
| Aurealis Award | Horror Novel | Lois Murphy | Soon | Transit Lounge |
| Aurealis Award | Horror Short Story | J Ashley-Smith | "Old Growth" | IFWG Publishing Australia (SQ Mag 31) |
| Aurealis Award | Young Adult Novel | Cally Black | In the Dark Spaces | Hardie Grant Egmont |
| Aurealis Award | Young Adult Short Story | Tansy Rayner Roberts | "Girl Reporter" | Girl Reporter (Book Smugglers) |
| Ditmar Award | Novel | Kaaron Warren | The Grief Hole | IWFG Publishing Australia |
| Ditmar Award | Best Novella or Novelette | Tansy Rayner Roberts | "Did We Break the End of the World?" | Defying Doomsday (Twelfth Planet Press) |
| Ditmar Award | Best Short Story | Cat Sparks | "No Fat Chicks" | In Your Face (TableCroft Publishing) |

### Poetry

| Award | Author | Title | Publisher |
| Adelaide Festival Awards for Literature | Not awarded | | |
| Anne Elder Award | Berndt Sellheim | Awake at the Wheel | Vagabond Press |
| Mary Gilmore Award | Aden Rolfe | False Nostalgia | Giramondo Publishing |
| New South Wales Premier's Literary Awards | Peter Boyle | Ghostspeaking | Vagabond Press |
| Victorian Premier's Literary Award | Maxine Beneba Clarke | Carrying the World | Hachette Australia |

### Drama

| Award | Category | Author | Title | Publisher |
| New South Wales Premier's Literary Awards | Script | Shirley Birse | The Code, Series 2, Episode 4 | Playmaker |
| Patrick White Playwrights' Award | Award | Kim Ho | Mirror's Edge | Sydney Theatre Company |
| Patrick White Playwrights' Award | Fellowship | Sue Smith | | |

### Non-Fiction

| Award | Category | Author | Title | Publisher |
| Adelaide Festival Awards for Literature | Non-Fiction | Not awarded | |
| Indie Book Awards Book of the Year | Non-Fiction | Helen Garner | Everywhere I Look | Text Publishing |
| National Biography Award | Biography | Tom D C Roberts | Before Rupert: Keith Murdoch and the Birth of a Dynasty | UQP |
| New South Wales Premier's Literary Awards | Non-Fiction | Thornton McCamish | Our Man Elsewhere: In Search of Alan Moorehead | Black Inc |
| New South Wales Premier's History Awards | Australian History | Mark McKenna | From the Edge: Australia’s Lost Histories | Melbourne University Publishing |
| New South Wales Premier's History Awards | Community and Regional History | Peter Hobbins, Ursula K Frederick and Anne Clarke | Stories from the Sandstone: Quarantine Inscriptions from Australia’s Immigrant Past | Arbon Publishing |
| New South Wales Premier's History Awards | General History | Sandra Wilson, Robert Cribb, Beatrice Trefalt and Dean Aszkielowicz | Japanese War Criminals: The Politics of Justice after the Second World War | Columbia University Press |
| Queensland Literary Awards | Non-Fiction | Cathy McLennan | Saltwater | University of Queensland Press |
| Victorian Premier's Literary Award | Non-fiction | Madeline Gleeson | Offshore: Behind the Wire on Manus and Nauru | NewSouth Publishing |

## Deaths

* 12 January – Jill Roe, historian, academic and author (born 1940)
* 10 March – Bill Leak, editorial and political cartoonist, caricaturist and portraitist (born 1956)
* 9 April – John Clarke, comedian, writer and satirist (born 1948 in New Zealand)
* 22 April – Donna Williams, writer, artist, singer-songwriter, screenwriter and sculptor (born 1963)
* 2 May – Michael Gurr, playwright, author, speech writer and screenwriter (born 1961)
* 3 May – Rosie Scott, novelist and lecturer (born 1948 in Wellington, New Zealand)
* 26 June – Jimmy Chi, playwright and composer (born 1948)
* 27 June – Rae Desmond Jones, poet, novelist, short story writer and politician (born 1941)
* 2 July – Fay Zwicky, poet, short-story writer, critic and academic best known for her autobiographical poem Kaddish, about her identity as a Jewish writer (born 1933)
* 3 August – Jack Wodhams, science fiction writer (born 1931 in London)
* 6 November – Sylvia Lawson, historian, journalist and critic (born 1932)
* 1 December – Ken Inglis, historian (born 1929)
* 22 December – Lilith Norman, children's writer and editor (born 1927)