# Prime Minister's Literary Awards

The Australian Prime Minister's Literary Awards (PMLA) were announced at the end of 2007 by the incoming First Rudd ministry following the 2007 election. They are administered by the Minister for the Arts.
The awards were designed as "a new initiative celebrating the contribution of Australian literature to the nation's cultural and intellectual life." The awards are held annually and initially provided a tax-free prize of A$100,000 in each category, making it Australia's richest literary award in total. In 2011, the prize money was split into $80,000 for each category winner and $5,000 for up to four short-listed entries. The award was initially given in four categories – fiction, non-fiction, young adult and children's fiction – as selected by three judging panels. In 2012, a poetry category was added and the former Prime Minister's Prize for Australian History was incorporated into the award. To be eligible, writers "must be a citizen or permanent resident of Australia."

## History

For the inaugural 2008 awards, six Australians were appointed by the Minister for the Environment, Heritage and the Arts to the judging panels: three each for the fiction and non-fiction awards. The final decisions on the shortlist and winners for the awards was made by Prime Minister (Kevin Rudd) based on the judging panels' recommendations.
Two new award categories were announced on 30 March 2010: "young adults' fiction" and "children's fiction." The prize for both new awards was also $100,000; its entries were judged by one judging panel.
Entries for the 2011 awards opened in January 2011 and an annual timetable was implemented: the shortlist was announced in late May and winners in early July. The awards were restructured to provide greater recognition for shortlisted authors. In each category, the winning book was awarded $80,000; $5,000 was awarded to up to four shortlisted titles. The eligibility criteria were extended to include e-books, and wordless picture books were eligible in the children's fiction category. The panellists from 2010 were returned for 2011.
In 2012, a new award for poetry was announced and the Prize for Australian History was incorporated.

## Winners

| Year | Fiction | Non-fiction | Young adult fiction | Children's fiction | Poetry | Australian history |
| 2008 | The Zookeeper's War by Steven Conte | Ochre and Rust: Artefacts and Encounters on Australian Frontiers by Philip Jones | NA | NA | NA | NA |
| 2009 | The Boat by Nam Le | House of Exile: The Life and Times of Heinrich Mann, and Nelly-Kroeger Mann by Evelyn Juers, and Drawing the Global Colour Line by Marilyn Lake and Henry Reynolds | NA | NA | NA | NA |
| 2010 | Dog Boy by Eva Hornung | The Colony: A History of Early Sydney by Grace Karskens | Confessions of a Liar, Thief and Failed Sex God by Bill Condon | Star Jumps by Lorraine Marwood | NA | NA |
| 2011 | Traitor by Stephen Daisley | The Hard Light of Day by Rod Moss | Graffiti Moon by Cath Crowley | Shake a Leg by Boori Monty Pryor and Jan Ormerod | NA | NA |
| 2012 | Foal's Bread by Gillian Mears | An Eye for Eternity: The Life of Manning Clark by Mark McKenna | When We Were Two by Robert Newton | Goodnight, Mice!, written by Frances Watts and illustrated by Judy Watson | Interferon Psalms by Luke Davies | The Biggest Estate on Earth by Bill Gammage |
| 2013 | Questions of Travel by Michelle de Kretser | The Australian Moment by George Megalogenis | Fog a Dox by Bruce Pascoe | Red by Libby Gleeson | Jam Tree Gully: Poems by John Kinsella | Farewell, Dear People by Ross McMullin |
| 2014 | A World of Other People by Steven Carroll, and The Narrow Road to the Deep North by Richard Flanagan | Moving Among Strangers by Gabrielle Carey, and Madeleine: A Life of Madeleine St John by Helen Trinca | The Incredible Here and Now by Felicity Castagna | Silver Buttons by Bob Graham | Drag Down to Unlock or Place an Emergency Call by Melinda Smith | Broken Nation: Australians in the Great War by Joan Beaumont, and Australia's Secret War: How Unionists Sabotaged Our Troops in World War II by Hal G.P. Colebatch |
| 2015 | The Golden Age by Joan London | John Olsen: An Artist's Life by Darleen Bungey, and Wild Bleak Bohemia: Marcus Clarke, Adam Lindsay Gordon and Henry Kendall by Michael Wilding | The Protected by Claire Zorn | One Minute's Silence by David Metzenthen and illustrated by Michael Camilleri | Poems 1957–2013 by Geoffrey Lehmann | Charles Bean by Ross Coulthart, and The Spy Catchers – The Official History of ASIO Vol 1 by David Horner |
| 2016 | The Life of Houses by Lisa Gorton and The Natural Way of Things by Charlotte Wood | On Stalin's Team: The Years of Living Dangerously in Soviet Politics by Sheila Fitzpatrick, and Thea Astley: Inventing her own Weather by Karen Lamb | A Single Stone by Meg McKinlay | Sister Heart by Sally Morgan | The Hazards by Sarah Holland-Batt | The Story of Australia's People. The Rise and Fall of Ancient Australia by Geoffrey Blainey, and Let My People Go: The untold story of Australia and the Soviet Jews 1959–89 by Sam Lipski and Suzanne D Rutland |
| 2017 | Their Brilliant Careers by Ryan O'Neill | Quicksilver by Nicolas Rothwell | Words in Deep Blue by Cath Crowley | Home in the Rain by Bob Graham, and Dragonfly Song by Wendy Orr | Headwaters by Anthony Lawrence | Atomic Thunder: The Maralinga Story by Elizabeth Tynan |
| 2018 | Border Districts by Gerald Murnane | Asia's Reckoning by Richard McGregor | This Is My Song by Richard Yaxley | Pea Pod Lullaby by Glenda Millard and Stephen Michael King | Blindness and Rage: A Phantasmagoria by Brian Castro | John Curtin's War: The coming of war in the Pacific, and reinventing Australia, volume 1 by John Edwards |
| 2019 | The Death of Noah Glass by Gail Jones | The Bible in Australia: A Cultural History by Meredith Lake | The Things That Will Not Stand by Michael Gerard Bauer | His Name Was Walter by Emily Rodda | Sun Music: New and Selected Poems by Judith Beveridge | Half the Perfect World: Writers, Dreamers and Drifters on Hydra, 1955–1964 by Paul Genoni and Tanya Dalziell |
| 2020 | The Yield by Tara June Winch | Songspirals: Sharing Women's Wisdom of Country through Songlines by Gay'Wu Group of Womenand Sea People: The Puzzle of Polynesia by Christina Thompson | How It Feels to Float by Helena Fox | Cooee Mittigar: A Song on Darug Songlines by Jasmine Seymour and Leanne Mulgo Watson (illustrator) | The Lost Arabs by Omar Sakr | Meeting the Waylo: Aboriginal Encounters in the Archipelago by Tiffany Shellam |
| 2021 | The Labyrinth by Amanda Lohrey | The Stranger Artist: Life at the edge of Kimberley painting by Quentin Sprague | Metal Fish, Falling Snow by Cath Moore | Fly on the Wall by Remy Lai and How to Make a Bird by Meg McKinlay and Matt Ottley (illustrator) | The Strangest Place: New and selected poems by Stephen Edgar | People of the River: Lost worlds of early Australia by Grace Karskens |
| 2022 | Red Heaven by Nicolas Rothwell | Rogue Forces: An Explosive Insiders’ Account of Australian SAS War Crimes in Afghanistan by Mark Willacy | The Gaps by Leanne Hall | Mina and the Whole Wide World by Sherryl Clark and Briony Stewart (illustrator) | Human Looking by Andy Jackson | Semut: The Untold Story of a Secret Australian Operation in WWII Borneo by Christine Helliwell |
| 2023 | Cold Enough for Snow by Jessica Au | My Father and Other Animals by Sam Vincent | The Greatest Thing by Sarah Winifred Searle | Open Your Heart to Country by Jasmine Seymour | At the Altar of Touch by Gavin Yuan Gao | Unmaking Angas Downs by Shannyn Palmer |
| 2024 | Anam by André Dao | Close to the Subject: Selected Works by Daniel Browning | We Could Be Something by Will Kostakis | Tamarra: A Story of Termites on Gurindji Country by Violet Wadrill, Topsy Dodd Ngarnjal, Leah Leaman, Cecelia Edwards, Cassandra Algy, Felicity Meakins, Briony Barr & Gregory Crocetti | Aphrodite by Amy Crutchfield | Donald Horne: A Life in the Lucky Country by Ryan Cropp |

## Winners and shortlists
### Australian history

PMLA for Australian History winners and shortlists :
| Year | Author | Title | Result |
| 2012 | Bill Gammage | The Biggest Estate on Earth | Winner |
| 2012 | James Boyce | 1835: The Founding of Melbourne and the Conquest of Australia | Finalist |
| 2012 | Charles Massy | Breaking the Sheep's Back | Finalist |
| 2012 | Russell McGregor | Indifferent Inclusion: Aboriginal people and the Australian Nation | Finalist |
| 2012 | Renegade Films Australia | Immigration Nation: The Secret History of Us | Finalist |
| 2013 | Ross McMullin | Farewell, dear people | Winner |
| 2013 | Frank Bongiorno | The Sex Lives of Australians: A History | Finalist |
| 2013 | Paul Ham | Sandakan | Finalist |
| 2013 | Jenny Hocking | Gough Whitlam | Finalist |
| 2013 | Nicole Moore | The Censor's Library | Finalist |
| 2014 | Joan Beaumont | Broken Nation: Australians in the Great War | Winner |
| 2014 | Hal G. P. Colebatch | Australia's Secret War: How Unionists Sabotaged Our Troops in World War II | Winner |
| 2014 | Mike Carlton | First Victory 1914 | Finalist |
| 2014 | Michael Pembroke | Arthur Phillip: Sailor, Mercenary, Governor, Spy | Finalist |
| 2014 | Clare Wright | The Forgotten Rebels of Eureka | Finalist |
| 2015 | Ross Coulthart | Charles Bean | Winner |
| 2015 | David Horner | The Spy Catchers: The Official History of ASIO Vol 1 | Winner |
| 2015 | Alan Atkinson | The Europeans in Australia – Volume Three: Nation | Finalist |
| 2015 | Peter Brune | Descent into Hell | Finalist |
| 2015 | Anne Henderson | Menzies at War | Finalist |
| 2016 | Geoffrey Blainey | The Story of Australia's People. The Rise and Fall of Ancient Australia | Winner |
| 2016 | Sam Lipski and Suzanne D Rutland | Let My People Go: The untold story of Australia and the Soviet Jews 1959–89 | Winner |
| 2016 | Peter Monteath and Valerie Munt | Red Professor: The Cold War Life of Fred Rose | Finalist |
| 2016 | Doug Morrissey | Ned Kelly: A Lawless Life | Finalist |
| 2016 | Robert Stevenson | The War with Germany: Volume III – The Centenary History of Australia and the Great War | Finalist |
| 2017 | Elizabeth Tynan | Atomic Thunder: The Maralinga Story | Winner |
| 2017 | Josephine Bastian | A Passion for Exploring New Countries' Matthew Flinders and George Bass | Finalist |
| 2017 | Neil McDonald | Valian for Truth: The Life of Chester Wilmot, War Correspondent | Finalist |
| 2017 | John Murphy | Evatt: A Life | Finalist |
| 2017 | Charlie Ward | A Handful of Sand: The Gurindji Struggle, After the Walk-off | Finalist |
| 2018 | John Edwards | John Curtin's War: The coming of war in the Pacific, and reinventing Australia, Volume 1 | Winner |
| 2018 | Jayne Persian | Beautiful Balts: From Displaced Persons to New Australians | Finalist |
| 2018 | Paul Irish | Hidden in Plain View: The Aboriginal People of Coastal Sydney | Finalist |
| 2018 | Timothy Rowse | Indigenous and Other Australians Since 1901 | Finalist |
| 2018 | Judith Brett | The Enigmatic Mr Deakin | Finalist |
| 2019 | Meredith Lake | The Bible in Australia: A Cultural History | Winner |
| 2019 | Anna Haebich | Dancing in Shadows: Histories of Nyungar Performance | Finalist |
| 2019 | Billy Griffiths | Deep Time Dreaming: Uncovering Ancient Australia | Finalist |
| 2019 | David Kemp | The Land of Dreams: How Australians Won Their Freedom, 1788–1860 | Finalist |
| 2019 | Clare Wright | You Daughters of Freedom: The Australians Who Won the Vote and Inspired the World | Finalist |
| 2020 | Tiffany Shellam | Meeting the Waylo: Aboriginal Encounters in the Archipelago | Winner |
| 2020 | Judith Brett | From Secret Ballot to Democracy Sausage: How Australia Got Compulsory Voting | Finalist |
| 2020 | Susan Lawrence and Peter Davies | Sludge: Disaster on Victoria's Goldfields | Finalist |
| 2020 | Marilyn Lake | Progressive New World: How Settler Colonialism and Transpacific Exchange Shaped American Reform | Finalist |
| 2020 | Scott Patterson | The Oarsmen: The Remarkable Story of the Men Who Rowed from the Great War to Peace | Finalist |
| 2021 | Grace Karskens | People of the River: Lost worlds of early Australia | Winner |
| 2021 | Michael Bennett | Pathfinders: A history of Aboriginal trackers in NSW | Finalist |
| 2021 | Mark Dunn | The Convict Valley: The Bloody Struggle on Australia's Early Frontier | Finalist |
| 2021 | Jason M. Gibson | Ceremony Men: Making Ethnography and the Return of the Strehlow Collection | Finalist |
| 2021 | Amanda Harris | Representing Australian Aboriginal Music and Dance 1930-1970 | Finalist |
| 2022 | Christine Helliwell | Semut: The Untold Story of a Secret Australian Operation in WWII Borneo | Winner |
| 2022 | Sheila Fitzpatrick | White Russians, Red Peril: A Cold War History of Migration to Australia | Finalist |
| 2022 | Mark McKenna | Return to Uluru | Finalist |
| 2022 | Deirdre O'Connell | Harlem Nights: The Secret History of Australia's Jazz Age | Finalist |
| 2022 | Peter Sutton and Keryn Walshe | Farmers or Hunter-Gatherers? The Dark Emu Debate | Finalist |
| 2023 | Shannyn Palmer | Unmaking Angas Downs: Myth and history on a Central Australian pastoral station | Winner |
| 2023 | Alan Atkinson | Elizabeth and John: The Macarthurs of Elizabeth Farm | Finalist |
| 2023 | Lachlan Strahan | Justice in Kelly Country: The story of the cop who hunted Australia’s most notorious bushrangers | Finalist |
| 2023 | Rohan Lloyd | Saving the Reef: The human story behind one of Australia’s greatest environmental treasures | Finalist |
| 2023 | Russell Marks | Black Lives, White Law: Locked up and locked out in Australia | Finalist |
| 2024 | Ryan Cropp | Donald Horne: A Life in the Lucky Country | Winner |
| 2024 | Rose Ellis | Bee Miles | Finalist |
| 2024 | Kate Fullagar | Bennelong and Phillip: A History Unravelled | Finalist |
| 2024 | David Marr | Killing for Country: A Family Story | Finalist |
| 2024 | Alecia Simmonds | Courting: An Intimate History of Love and the Law | Finalist |

### Children's fiction

PMLA for Children's Fiction winners and shortlists :
| Year | Author | Title | Result |
| 2010 | Lorraine Marwood | Star Jumps | Winner |
| 2010 | Kate Constable | Cicada Summer | Finalist |
| 2010 | Ursula Dubosarsky, illus. by Andrew Joyner | The Terrible Plop | Finalist |
| 2010 | Andy Griffiths, illus. by Terry Denton | Just Macbeth! | Finalist |
| 2010 | Leigh Hobbs | Mr Chicken Goes to Paris | Finalist |
| 2010 | Alison Lester | Running with the Horses | Finalist |
| 2010 | Martine Murray, illus. by Sally Rippin | Mannie and the Long Brave Day | Finalist |
| 2010 | Jen Storer | Tensy Farlow and the Home for Mislaid Children | Finalist |
| 2010 | Margaret Wild, illus. by Freya Blackwood | Harry and Hopper | Finalist |
| 2011 | Boori Monty Pryor and Jan Ormerod | Shake a Leg | Winner |
| 2011 | Bronwyn Bancroft | Why I Love Australia | Finalist |
| 2011 | Lucy Christopher | Flyaway | Finalist |
| 2011 | Morris Gleitzman | Now | Finalist |
| 2011 | Bob Graham | April Underhill, Tooth Fairy | Finalist |
| 2012 | Frances Watts, illus. by Judy Watson | Goodnight, Mice! | Winner |
| 2012 | Maggie Alderson | Evangeline, The Wish Keeper's Helper | Finalist |
| 2012 | Graeme Base | The Jewel Fish of Karnak | Finalist |
| 2012 | Anne Brooksbank | Father's Day | Finalist |
| 2012 | Sonya Hartnett, illus. by Lucia Masciullo | Come Down, Cat! | Finalist |
| 2013 | Libby Gleeson | Red | Winner |
| 2013 | Peter Friend, illus. by Andrew Joyner | What's the Matter, Aunty May? | Finalist |
| 2013 | Jane Godwin, illus. by Anna Walker | Today We Have No Plans | Finalist |
| 2013 | Marianne Musgrove | The Beginner's Guide to Revenge | Finalist |
| 2014 | Bob Graham | Silver Buttons | Winner |
| 2014 | Julie Hunt | Song for a Scarlet Runner | Finalist |
| 2014 | Barry Jonsberg | My Life as an Alphabet | Finalist |
| 2014 | Alison Lester | Kissed by the Moon | Finalist |
| 2014 | Shaun Tan | Rules of Summer | Finalist |
| 2015 | David Metzenthen, illus. by Michael Camilleri | One Minute's Silence | Winner |
| 2015 | Tristan Bancks | Two Wolves | Finalist |
| 2015 | Nicola Connelly, illus. by Annie White | My Dad is a Bear | Finalist |
| 2015 | Irena Kobald, illus. by Freya Blackwood | My Two Blankets | Finalist |
| 2015 | Judith Rossell | Withering-by-Sea | Finalist |
| 2016 | Sally Morgan | Sister Heart | Winner |
| 2016 | Elise Hurst | Adelaide's Secret World | Finalist |
| 2016 | Danny Parker and Freya Blackwood | Perfect | Finalist |
| 2016 | Tohby Riddle | The Greatest Gatsby: A visual book of grammar | Finalist |
| 2016 | Anna Walker | Mr Huff | Finalist |
| 2017 | Bob Graham | Home in the Rain | Winner |
| 2017 | Wendy Orr | Dragonfly Song | Winner |
| 2017 | Janet A. Holmes, illus. by Jonathan Bentley | Blue Sky, Yellow Kite | Finalist |
| 2017 | Dee Huxley, illus. by Oliver Huxley | My Brother | Finalist |
| 2017 | Tamsin Janu | Figgy and the President | Finalist |
| 2018 | Glenda Millard and Stephen Michael King | Pea Pod Lullaby | Winner |
| 2018 | Phil Cummings and Phil Lesnie | Feathers | Finalist |
| 2018 | Tamsin Janu | Figgy Takes the City | Finalist |
| 2018 | Lisa Shanahan and Binny Talib | Hark, It's Me, Ruby Lee! | Finalist |
| 2018 | Sarah Brennan and Jane Tanner | Storm Whale | Finalist |
| 2019 | Emily Rodda | His Name Was Walter | Winner |
| 2019 | Eddie Ayres, illus. by Ronak Taher | Sonam and the Silence | Finalist |
| 2019 | Margaret Wild, illus. by Freya Blackwood | The Feather | Finalist |
| 2019 | Kirli Saunders, illus. by Matt Ottley | The Incredible Freedom Machines | Finalist |
| 2019 | David Mackintosh | Waiting for Chicken Smith | Finalist |
| 2020 | Jasmine Seymour, illus. by Leanne Mulgo Watson | Cooee Mittigar: A Song on Darug Songlines | Winner |
| 2020 | Dion Beasley, illus. by Johanna Bell | Cheeky Dogs: To Lake Nash and Back | Finalist |
| 2020 | Christina Booth | One Careless Night | Finalist |
| 2020 | Martin Ed Chatterton | Winter of the White Bear | Finalist |
| 2020 | Meg McKinlay | Catch a Falling Star | Finalist |
| 2021 | Remy Lai | Fly on the Wall | Winner |
| 2021 | Meg McKinlay, illus. by Matt Ottley | How to Make a Bird | Winner |
| 2021 | Jaclyn Moriarty, illus. by Kelly Canby | The Stolen Prince of Cloudburst | Finalist |
| 2021 | Kate Constable | The January Stars | Finalist |
| 2021 | Danielle Binks | The Year the Maps Changed | Finalist |
| 2022 | Sherryl Clark, illus. by Briony Stewart | Mina and the Whole Wide World | Winner |
| 2022 | Freya Blackwood | The Boy and the Elephant | Finalist |
| 2022 | Gregg Dreise | Common Wealth | Finalist |
| 2022 | Karen Foxlee | Dragon Skin | Finalist |
| 2022 | Maryam Master, illus. by Astred Hicks | Exit Through the Gift Shop | Finalist |
| 2023 | Jasmine Seymour | Open Your Heart to Country | Winner |
| 2023 | Aunty Shaa Smith and Yandaarra | The Dunggiirr Brothers and the Caring Song of the Whale | Finalist |
| 2023 | Gabrielle Wang | Zadie Ma and the Dog Who Chased the Moon | Finalist |
| 2023 | Randa Abdel-Fattah, illus. by Maxine Beneba Clarke | 11 Words for Love | Finalist |
| 2023 | Zeno Sworder | My Strange Shrinking Parents | Finalist |
| 2024 | Violet Wadrill, Topsy Dodd Ngarnjal, Leah Leaman, Cecelia Edwards, Cassandra Algy, Felicity Meakins, Briony Barr & Gregory Crocetti | Tamarra: A Story of Termites on Gurindji Country | Winner |
| 2024 | Jared Field, illus. by Jeremy Worrall | Etta and the Shadow Taboo | Finalist |
| 2024 | Remy Lai | Ghost Book | Finalist |
| 2024 | Rebecca Lim | Two Sparrowhawks in a Lonely Sky | Finalist |
| 2024 | Alice Pung, illus. by Sher Rill Ng | Millie Mak the Maker | Finalist |

### Fiction

PMLA for Fiction winners and shortlists :
| Year | Author | Title | Result |
| 2008 | Steven Conte | The Zookeeper's War | Winner |
| 2008 | Gail Jones | Sorry | Finalist |
| 2008 | Mireille Juchau | Burning In | Finalist |
| 2008 | Tom Keneally | The Widow and Her Hero | Finalist |
| 2008 | Malcolm Knox | Jamaica | Finalist |
| 2008 | David Malouf | The Complete Stories | Finalist |
| 2008 | Dorothy Porter | El Dorado | Finalist |
| 2009 | Nam Le | The Boat | Winner |
| 2009 | Murray Bail | The Pages | Finalist |
| 2009 | Geraldine Brooks | People of the Book | Finalist |
| 2009 | Richard Flanagan | Wanting | Finalist |
| 2009 | Peter Goldsworthy | Everything I Knew | Finalist |
| 2009 | Sofie Laguna | One Foot Wrong | Finalist |
| 2009 | Joan London | The Good Parents | Finalist |
| 2010 | Eva Hornung | Dog Boy | Winner |
| 2010 | J. M. Coetzee | Summertime | Finalist |
| 2010 | Deborah Forster | The Book of Emmett | Finalist |
| 2010 | Alan Gould | The Lakewoman | Finalist |
| 2010 | David Malouf | Ransom | Finalist |
| 2010 | Alex Miller | Lovesong | Finalist |
| 2010 | Alison Wong | As the Earth Turns Silver | Finalist |
| 2011 | Stephen Daisley | Traitor | Winner |
| 2011 | Roberta Lowing | Notorious | Finalist |
| 2011 | Roger McDonald | When Colts Ran | Finalist |
| 2011 | David Musgrave | Glissando | Finalist |
| 2011 | Kim Scott | That Deadman Dance | Finalist |
| 2012 | Gillian Mears | Foal's Bread | Winner |
| 2012 | Anna Funder | All That I Am | Finalist |
| 2012 | Kate Grenville | Sarah Thornhill | Finalist |
| 2012 | Janette Turner Hospital | Forecast: Turbulence | Finalist |
| 2012 | Alex Miller | Autumn Laing | Finalist |
| 2013 | Michelle de Kretser | Questions of Travel | Winner |
| 2013 | Romy Ash | Floundering | Finalist |
| 2013 | Peter Carey | The Chemistry of Tears | Finalist |
| 2013 | Christopher Koch | Lost Voices | Finalist |
| 2013 | Carrie Tiffany | Mateship with Birds | Finalist |
| 2014 | Steven Carroll | A World of Other People | Winner |
| 2014 | Richard Flanagan | The Narrow Road to the Deep North | Winner |
| 2014 | Fiona McFarlane | The Night Guest | Finalist |
| 2014 | Alex Miller | Coal Creek | Finalist |
| 2014 | Nicolas Rothwell | Belomor | Finalist |
| 2015 | Joan London | The Golden Age | Winner |
| 2015 | Peter Carey | Amnesia | Finalist |
| 2015 | Elizabeth Harrower | In Certain Circles | Finalist |
| 2015 | Sonya Hartnett | Golden Boys | Finalist |
| 2015 | Rohan Wilson | To Name Those Lost | Finalist |
| 2016 | Lisa Gorton | The Life of Houses | Winner |
| 2016 | Charlotte Wood | The Natural Way of Things | Winner |
| 2016 | Steven Carroll | Forever Young | Finalist |
| 2016 | David Ireland | The World Repair Video Game | Finalist |
| 2016 | Steve Toltz | Quicksand | Finalist |
| 2017 | Ryan O'Neill | Their Brilliant Careers | Winner |
| 2017 | Steven Amsterdam | The Easy Way Out | Finalist |
| 2017 | Mark O'Flynn | The Last Days of Ava Langdon | Finalist |
| 2017 | Philip Salom | Waiting | Finalist |
| 2017 | Josephine Wilson | Extinctions | Finalist |
| 2018 | Gerald Murnane | Border Districts | Winner |
| 2018 | Peter Carey | A Long Way from Home | Finalist |
| 2018 | Richard Flanagan | First Person | Finalist |
| 2018 | Kim Scott | Taboo | Finalist |
| 2018 | Michelle de Kretser | The Life to Come | Finalist |
| 2019 | Gail Jones | The Death of Noah Glass | Winner |
| 2019 | Rodney Hall | A Stolen Season | Finalist |
| 2019 | Melissa Lucashenko | Too Much Lip | Finalist |
| 2019 | Suneeta Peres da Costa | Saudade | Finalist |
| 2019 | Laura Elizabeth Woollett | Beautiful Revolutionary | Finalist |
| 2020 | Tara June Winch | The Yield | Winner |
| 2020 | J. M. Coetzee | The Death of Jesus | Finalist |
| 2020 | Carrie Tiffany | Exploded View | Finalist |
| 2020 | Lucy Treloar | Wolfe Island | Finalist |
| 2020 | Charlotte Wood | The Weekend | Finalist |
| 2021 | Amanda Lohrey | The Labyrinth | Winner |
| 2021 | K. M. Kruimink | A Treacherous Country | Finalist |
| 2021 | Jo Lennan | In the Time of Foxes | Finalist |
| 2021 | Andrew Pippos | Lucky's | Finalist |
| 2021 | Evie Wyld | The Bass Rock | Finalist |
| 2022 | Nicolas Rothwell | Red Heaven | Winner |
| 2022 | Tony Birch | Dark as Last Night | Finalist |
| 2022 | Stephen Downes | The Hands of Pianists | Finalist |
| 2022 | Hannah Kent | Devotion | Finalist |
| 2022 | Angela O'Keeffe | Night Blue | Finalist |
| 2023 | Jessica Au | Cold Enough for Snow | Winner |
| 2023 | Fiona McFarlane | The Sun Walks Down | Finalist |
| 2023 | George Haddad | Losing Face | Finalist |
| 2023 | Paddy O'Reilly | Other Houses | Finalist |
| 2023 | Yumna Kassab | The Lovers | Finalist |
| 2024 | André Dao | Anam | Winner |
| 2024 | Kate Grenville | Restless Dolly Maunder | Finalist |
| 2024 | Melissa Lucashenko | Edenglassie | Finalist |
| 2024 | Catherine McNamara | The Carnal Fugues | Finalist |
| 2024 | Charlotte Wood | Stone Yard Devotional | Finalist |

### Nonfiction

PMLA for Nonfiction winners and shortlists :
| Year | Author | Title | Result |
| 2008 | Philip Jones | Ochre and Rust: Artefacts and Encounters on Australian Frontiers | Winner |
| 2008 | Philip Dwyer | Napoleon: The Path to Power, 1769–1799 | Finalist |
| 2008 | Raymond Evans | A History of Queensland | Finalist |
| 2008 | Zarah Ghahramani with Robert Hillman | My Life as a Traitor | Finalist |
| 2008 | Germaine Greer | Shakespeare's Wife | Finalist |
| 2008 | Paul Ham | Vietnam: The Australian War | Finalist |
| 2008 | Clive James | Cultural Amnesia: Notes in the Margin of My Time | Finalist |
| 2009 | Evelyn Juers | House of Exile: The Life and Times of Heinrich Mann and Nelly-Kroeger Mann | Winner |
| 2009 | Marilyn Lake and Henry Reynolds | Drawing the Global Colour Line | Winner |
| 2009 | James Boyce | Van Diemen's Land | Finalist |
| 2009 | Brian Dibble | Doing Life: A Biography of Elizabeth Jolley | Finalist |
| 2009 | Jenny Hocking | Gough Whitlam: A Moment in History | Finalist |
| 2009 | Chloe Hooper | The Tall Man: Death and Life on Palm Island | Finalist |
| 2009 | David Marr | The Henson Case | Finalist |
| 2009 | Don Watson | American Journeys | Finalist |
| 2010 | Grace Karskens | The Colony: A History of Early Sydney | Winner |
| 2010 | Michael Cathcart | The Water Dreamers: The Remarkable History of Our Dry Continent | Finalist |
| 2010 | Will Elliott | Strange Places: A Memoir of Mental Illness | Finalist |
| 2010 | John Keane | The Life and Death of Democracy | Finalist |
| 2010 | Mark Tredinnick | The Blue Plateau: A Landscape Memoir | Finalist |
| 2010 | Shirley Walker | The Ghost at the Wedding | Finalist |
| 2011 | Rod Moss | The Hard Light of Day | Winner |
| 2011 | Delia Falconer | Sydney | Finalist |
| 2011 | Paul Kelly | How To Make Gravy | Finalist |
| 2011 | Richard McGregor | The Party | Finalist |
| 2011 | Patrick Wilcken | Claude Lévi-Strauss: The Poet in the Laboratory | Finalist |
| 2012 | Mark McKenna | An Eye for Eternity: The Life of Manning Clark | Winner |
| 2012 | Geoffrey Blainey | A Short History of Christianity | Finalist |
| 2012 | Alexander Jonathan Brown | Michael Kirby Paradoxes and Principles | Finalist |
| 2012 | Adrian Hyland | Kinglake-350 | Finalist |
| 2012 | Anthony Macris | When Horse Became Saw | Finalist |
| 2013 | George Megalogenis | The Australian Moment | Winner |
| 2013 | Malcolm Knox | Bradman's War | Finalist |
| 2013 | Chris Masters | Uncommon Soldier | Finalist |
| 2013 | Adrian Mitchell | Plein Airs and Graces | Finalist |
| 2013 | Barbara Santich | Bold Palates | Finalist |
| 2014 | Gabrielle Carey | Moving Among Strangers | Winner |
| 2014 | Helen Trinca | Madeleine: A Life of Madeleine St John | Winner |
| 2014 | Nick Cater | The Lucky Culture | Finalist |
| 2014 | Philip Dwyer | Citizen Emperor | Finalist |
| 2014 | Michael Fullilove | Rendezvous with Destiny | Finalist |
| 2015 | Darleen Bungey | John Olsen: An Artist's Life | Winner |
| 2015 | Barrie Cassidy | Private Bill | Finalist |
| 2015 | Helen Garner | This House of Grief: The Story of a Murder Trial | Finalist |
| 2015 | John Gascoigne | Encountering the Pacific: In the Age of Enlightenment | Finalist |
| 2015 | Michael Wilding | Wild Bleak Bohemia: Marcus Clarke, Adam Lindsay Gordon and Henry Kendall | Finalist |
| 2016 | Sheila Fitzpatrick | On Stalin's Team: The Years of Living Dangerously in Soviet Politics | Winner |
| 2016 | Karen Lamb | Thea Astley: Inventing her own Weather | Winner |
| 2016 | Julie Cotter | Tom Roberts and the Art of Portraiture | Finalist |
| 2016 | Drusilla Modjeska | Second Half First | Finalist |
| 2016 | Tim Winton | Island Home | Finalist |
| 2017 | Nicolas Rothwell | Quicksilver | Winner |
| 2017 | Suzanne Falkiner | Mick: A Life of Randolph Stow | Finalist |
| 2017 | Tom Griffiths | The Art of Time Travel: Historians and their Craft | Finalist |
| 2017 | Thornton McCamish | Our Man Elsewhere: In Search of Alan Moorehead | Finalist |
| 2017 | Sebastian Smee | The Art of Rivalry: Four Friendships, Betrayals, and Breakthroughs in Modern Art | Finalist |
| 2018 | Richard McGregor | Asia's Reckoning | Winner |
| 2018 | Sheila Fitzpatrick | Mischka's War: A European Odyssey of the 1940s | Finalist |
| 2018 | Chris Masters | No Front Line: Australia's Special Forces at War in Afghanistan | Finalist |
| 2018 | Stuart Kells | The Library: A Catalogue of Wonders | Finalist |
| 2018 | Jelena Dokic and Jessica Halloran | Unbreakable | Finalist |
| 2019 | Paul Genoni and Tanya Dalziell | Half the Perfect World: Writers, Dreamers and Drifters on Hydra, 1955–1964 | Winner |
| 2019 | Cynthia Banham | A Certain Light: A Memoir of Family, Loss and Hope | Finalist |
| 2019 | Gabrielle Chan | Rusted Off: Why Country Australia Is Fed Up | Finalist |
| 2019 | Chloe Hooper | The Arsonist: A Mind on Fire | Finalist |
| 2019 | Maria Tumarkin | Axiomatic | Finalist |
| 2020 | Gay'Wu Group of Women | Songspirals: Sharing Women's Wisdom of Country through Songlines | Winner |
| 2020 | Christina Thompson | Sea People: The Puzzle of Polynesia | Winner |
| 2020 | Tim Bonyhady | The Enchantment of the Long-haired Rat | Finalist |
| 2020 | Jess Hill | See What You Made Me Do | Finalist |
| 2020 | Jessica White | Hearing Maud: A Journey for a Voice | Finalist |
| 2021 | Quentin Sprague | The Stranger Artist: Life at the Edge of Kimberley Painting | Winner |
| 2021 | Andrew Darby | Flight Lines: Across the Globe on a Journey with the Astonishing Ultramarathon Birds | Finalist |
| 2021 | Tegan Bennett Daylight | The Details: On Love, Death and Reading | Finalist |
| 2021 | Cassandra Pybus | Truganini: Journey Through the Apocalypse | Finalist |
| 2021 | Suzanne Smith | The Altar Boys | Finalist |
| 2022 | Mark Willacy | Rogue Forces: An Explosive Insiders' Account of Australian SAS War Crimes in Afghanistan | Winner |
| 2022 | Paul Cleary | Title Fight: How the Yindjibarndi Battled and Defeated a Mining Giant | Finalist |
| 2022 | Peter Edwell | The Case That Stopped a Nation: The Archibald Prize controversy of 1944 | Finalist |
| 2022 | John Safran | Puff Piece | Finalist |
| 2022 | Chelsea Watego | Another Day in the Colony | Finalist |
| 2023 | Sam Vincent | My Father and Other Animals: How I took on the family farm | Winner |
| 2023 | Brigitta Olubas | Shirley Hazzard: A writing life | Finalist |
| 2023 | Debra Dank | We Come With This Place | Finalist |
| 2023 | Louisa Lim | Indelible City: Dispossession and defiance in Hong Kong | Finalist |
| 2023 | Thom van Dooren | A World in a Shell: Snail stories for a time of extinctions | Finalist |
| 2024 | Daniel Browning | Close to the Subject: Selected Works | Winner |
| 2024 | Sarah Firth | Eventually Everything Connects | Finalist |
| 2024 | Maggie MacKellar | Graft: Motherhood, Family and a Year on the Land | Finalist |
| 2024 | Alex Miller | A Kind of Confession | Finalist |
| 2024 | Harry Saddler | A Clear Flowing Yarra | Finalist |

### Poetry

PMLA for Poetry winners and shortlists :
| Year | Author | Title | Result |
| 2012 | Luke Davies | Interferon Psalms | Winner |
| 2012 | Ali Alizadeh | Ashes in the Air | Finalist |
| 2012 | John Kinsella | Armour | Finalist |
| 2012 | John Mateer | Southern Barbarians | Finalist |
| 2012 | Gig Ryan | New and Selected Poems | Finalist |
| 2013 | John Kinsella | Jam Tree Gully: Poems | Winner |
| 2013 | Eileen Chong | Burning Rice | Finalist |
| 2013 | Lisa Jacobson | The Sunlit Zone | Finalist |
| 2013 | Jennifer Maiden | Liquid Nitrogen | Finalist |
| 2013 | Peter Rose | Crimson Crop | Finalist |
| 2014 | Melinda Smith | Drag Down to Unlock or Place an Emergency Call | Winner |
| 2014 | Sarah Day | Tempo | Finalist |
| 2014 | Stephen Edgar | Eldershaw | Finalist |
| 2014 | Geoff Page | 1953 | Finalist |
| 2014 | Jakob Ziguras | Chains of Snow | Finalist |
| 2015 | Geoffrey Lehmann | Poems 1957–2013 | Winner |
| 2015 | Judith Beveridge | Devadatta's Poems | Finalist |
| 2015 | Stephen Edgar | Exhibits of the Sun | Finalist |
| 2015 | David Malouf | Earth Hour | Finalist |
| 2015 | Alex Skovron | Towards the Equator: New & Selected Poems | Finalist |
| 2016 | Sarah Holland-Batt | The Hazards | Winner |
| 2016 | Robert Adamson | Net Needle | Finalist |
| 2016 | Michael Farrell | Cocky's Joy | Finalist |
| 2016 | Les Murray | Waiting for the Past | Finalist |
| 2016 | Simon West | The Ladder | Finalist |
| 2017 | Anthony Lawrence | Headwaters | Winner |
| 2017 | Eileen Chong | Painting Red Orchids | Finalist |
| 2017 | Joel Deane | Year of the Wasp | Finalist |
| 2017 | Liam Ferney | Content | Finalist |
| 2017 | Antigone Kefala | Fragments | Finalist |
| 2018 | Brian Castro | Blindness and Rage: A Phantasmagoria | Winner |
| 2018 | Adam Aitken | Archipelago | Finalist |
| 2018 | Bonny Cassidy | Chatelaine | Finalist |
| 2018 | Fiona Wright | Domestic Interior | Finalist |
| 2018 | Stephen Edgar | Transparencies | Finalist |
| 2019 | Judith Beveridge | Sun Music: New and Selected Poems | Winner |
| 2019 | Pam Brown | Click Here For What We Do | Finalist |
| 2019 | Keri Glastonbury | Newcastle Sonnets | Finalist |
| 2019 | Jill Jones | Viva the Real | Finalist |
| 2019 | Alison Whittaker | BlakWork | Finalist |
| 2020 | Omar Sakr | The Lost Arabs | Winner |
| 2020 | П. O. | Heide | Finalist |
| 2020 | Nandi Chinna | The Future Keepers | Finalist |
| 2020 | Lisa Gorton | Empirical | Finalist |
| 2020 | L. K. Holt | Birth Plan | Finalist |
| 2021 | Stephen Edgar | The Strangest Place: New and Selected Poems | Winner |
| 2021 | Laurie Duggan | Homer Street | Finalist |
| 2021 | Jaya Savige | Change Machine | Finalist |
| 2021 | John A. Scott | Shorter Lives | Finalist |
| 2021 | Mags Webster | Nothing to Declare | Finalist |
| 2022 | Andy Jackson | Human Looking | Winner |
| 2022 | Jordie Albiston | Fifteeners | Finalist |
| 2022 | John Foulcher | Dancing with Stephen Hawking | Finalist |
| 2022 | Caitlin Maling | Fish Work | Finalist |
| 2022 | Elfie Shiosaki | Homecoming | Finalist |
| 2023 | Gavin Yuan Gao | At the Altar of Touch | Winner |
| 2023 | Lionel Fogarty | Harvest Lingo | Finalist |
| 2023 | Rae White | Exactly As I Am | Finalist |
| 2023 | Sarah Holland-Batt | The Jaguar | Finalist |
| 2023 | Scott-Patrick Mitchell | Clean | Finalist |
| 2024 | Amy Crutchfield | The Cyprian | Winner |
| 2024 | Luke Beesley | In the Photograph | Finalist |
| 2024 | Ali Cobby Eckermann | She Is the Earth | Finalist |
| 2024 | Jennifer Maiden | Golden Bridge: New Poems | Finalist |
| 2024 | Autumn Royal | The Drama Student | Finalist |

### Young adult fiction

PMLA for Young Adult Fiction winners and shortlists :
| Year | Author | Title | Result |
| 2010 | Bill Condon | Confessions of a Liar, Thief and Failed Sex God | Winner |
| 2010 | Lucy Christopher | Stolen | Finalist |
| 2010 | Judith Clarke | The Winds of Heaven | Finalist |
| 2010 | Cassandra Golds | The Museum of Mary Child | Finalist |
| 2010 | Phillip Gwynne | Swerve | Finalist |
| 2010 | David Metzenthen | Jarvis 24 | Finalist |
| 2010 | Gabrielle Williams | Beatle Meets Destiny | Finalist |
| 2011 | Cath Crowley | Graffiti Moon | Winner |
| 2011 | Laura Buzo | Good Oil | Finalist |
| 2011 | Cassandra Golds | The Three Loves of Persimmon | Finalist |
| 2011 | Joanne Horniman | About a Girl | Finalist |
| 2011 | Melina Marchetta | The Piper's Son | Finalist |
| 2012 | Robert Newton | When We Were Two | Winner |
| 2012 | Bill Condon | A Straight Line to My Heart | Finalist |
| 2012 | Barry Jonsberg | Being Here | Finalist |
| 2012 | Sue Lawson | Pan's Whisper | Finalist |
| 2012 | Sue Saliba | Alaska | Finalist |
| 2013 | Bruce Pascoe | Fog a Dox | Winner |
| 2013 | Jessica Davidson | Everything Left Unsaid | Finalist |
| 2013 | Sonya Hartnett | The Children of the King | Finalist |
| 2013 | Sue McPherson | Grace Beside Me | Finalist |
| 2013 | Vikki Wakefield | Friday Brown | Finalist |
| 2014 | Felicity Castagna | The Incredible Here and Now | Winner |
| 2014 | Cassandra Golds | Pureheart | Finalist |
| 2014 | Simmone Howell | Girl Defective | Finalist |
| 2014 | Melissa Keil | Life in Outer Space | Finalist |
| 2014 | Will Kostakis | The First Third | Finalist |
| 2015 | Claire Zorn | The Protected | Winner |
| 2015 | Darren Groth | Are You Seeing Me? | Finalist |
| 2015 | Rebecca Lim | The Astrologer's Daughter | Finalist |
| 2015 | Doug MacLeod | Tigers on the Beach | Finalist |
| 2015 | Diana Sweeney | The Minnow | Finalist |
| 2016 | Meg McKinlay | A Single Stone | Winner |
| 2016 | Jane Harrison | Becoming Kirrali Lewis | Finalist |
| 2016 | Amie Kaufman and Jay Kristoff | Illuminae: The Illuminae Files_01 | Finalist |
| 2016 | Vikki Wakefield | In Between Days | Finalist |
| 2016 | Lili Wilkinson | Green Valentine | Finalist |
| 2017 | Cath Crowley | Words in Deep Blue | Winner |
| 2017 | Zana Fraillon | The Bone Sparrow | Finalist |
| 2017 | Glenda Millard | The Stars at Oktober Bend | Finalist |
| 2017 | Dianne Touchell | Forgetting Foster | Finalist |
| 2017 | Claire Zorn | One Would Think Deep | Finalist |
| 2018 | Richard Yaxley | This Is My Song | Winner |
| 2018 | Demet Divaroren | Living on Hope Street | Finalist |
| 2018 | Judith Clarke | My Lovely Frankie | Finalist |
| 2018 | Bruce Whatley | Ruben | Finalist |
| 2018 | Zana Fraillon | The Ones that Disappeared | Finalist |
| 2019 | Michael Gerard Bauer | The Things That Will Not Stand | Winner |
| 2019 | Clare Atkins | Between Us | Finalist |
| 2019 | Karen Foxlee | Lenny's Book of Everything | Finalist |
| 2019 | Sharon Kernot | The Art of Taxidermy | Finalist |
| 2019 | Shaun Tan | Cicada | Finalist |
| 2020 | Helena Fox | How It Feels to Float | Winner |
| 2020 | Wai Chim | The Surprising Power of a Good Dumpling | Finalist |
| 2020 | Neil Grant | The Honeyman and the Hunter | Finalist |
| 2020 | Malla Nunn | When the Ground Is Hard | Finalist |
| 2020 | Vikki Wakefield | This Is How We Change the Ending | Finalist |
| 2021 | Cath Moore | Metal Fish, Falling Snow | Winner |
| 2021 | Rawah Arja | The F Team | Finalist |
| 2021 | Davina Bell | The End of the World Is Bigger than Love | Finalist |
| 2021 | Jane Godwin | When Rain Turns to Snow | Finalist |
| 2021 | Georgina Young | Loner | Finalist |
| 2022 | Leanne Hall | The Gaps | Winner |
| 2022 | Safdar Ahmed | Still Alive: Notes from Australia's Immigration Detention System | Finalist |
| 2022 | Clayton Zame Comber | 100 Remarkable Feats of Xander Maz | Finalist |
| 2022 | Rebecca Lim | Tiger Daughter | Finalist |
| 2022 | Archie Roach | Tell Me Why (For Young Adults) | Finalist |
| 2023 | Sarah Winifred Searle | The Greatest Thing | Winner |
| 2023 | Carly Nugent | Sugar | Finalist |
| 2023 | Eva Collins | Ask No Questions | Finalist |
| 2023 | Lystra Rose | The Upwelling | Finalist |
| 2023 | Mike Lucas | What We All Saw | Finalist |
| 2024 | Will Kostakis | We Could Be Something | Winner |
| 2024 | Karen Comer | Grace Notes | Finalist |
| 2024 | Melissa Kang & Yumi Stynes | Welcome to Sex | Finalist |
| 2024 | Gary Lonesborough | We Didn't Think It Through | Finalist |
| 2024 | Lili Wilkinson | A Hunger of Thorns | Finalist |