The Hindu : International : English fiction prize for Australian

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Wednesday, Mar 15, 2006

International

International

English fiction prize for Australian

Kate Grenville wins Commonwealth honour

Kate Grenville

MELBOURNE: Australia's Kate Grenville on Tuesday won the 2006 Commonwealth Writers' Prize for The Secret River, a novel about a convict's struggle to build a life for his family after being shipped to a 19th-century Australian penal colony.

The book "is a powerful historical novel which acknowledges the competing claims of settlers and Aborigines," during the time period, said a statement from the judging panel's chairman, Prof. Chris Wallace-Crabbe of the University of Melbourne.

Grenville follows in the footsteps of Peter Carey, Richard Flanagan and Murray Bail — previous Australian winners of the £10,000 best book prize.

The winners were announced by Prince Edward, the Earl of Wessex, at a ceremony here. On Wednesday night the city will host the opening ceremony of the Commonwealth Games.

The Best First Book Award worth £3,000 went to Mark McWatt from Guyana for Suspended Sentences: Fictions of Atonement.

The annual Commonwealth Writers Prize rewards the best in fiction written in English, by both established and new writers, in the Commonwealth grouping of former British colonies.

Prof. Wallace-Crabbe said McWatt's book "presents a delightful caravan of stories that explore the changing character of Guyana." — AP

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