Viva La Novella VII - Launch

The Viva la Novella Prize is Australia’s only standalone prize for short novels. Since its inception, it has seen surprising, original & brilliant writing from debut and emerging writers published. Think Jane Rawson, George Haddad, Mirandi Riwoe, Stephen Wright - the list goes on!

This year's shortlisted authors are:

Carly Cappielli for Listurbia

Grace Chan for The Ship of Theseus

Joshua Mostafa for Offshore

Sophie Overett for Like a Moth Between Your Hands

Tegan Webb for Klea and Xta

Want to know who the two 2019 winners will be? Join us to find out!

Their books will be available to purchase on the night!

About the Prize

Viva la Novella is an annual prize awarded for short works between twenty and fifty thousand words. Since its beginnings in 2013 the award has published fourteen books by a wide range of authors including Jane Rawson, George Haddad and Stephen Wright – several of which have gone on to be shortlisted for, or win, other prizes.

Now in its seventh year, the Viva la Novella prize is Australia’s only standalone prize for short novels. Since its inception, it has published original and brilliant writing from debut and emerging writers. In 2017 Marlee Jane Ward’s novella Welcome to Orphancorp won the Victorian Premier’s Young Adult Fiction Prize. In 2018 Mirandi Riwoe’s The Fish Girl - a firm staff favourite at Better Read Than Dead - was shortlisted for the Stella Prize and the Queensland Prize for Fiction.

Although these volumes are slim, they continue to demonstrate how powerful the short form can be.