The AAP report, which was picked up by "The Age" and "The Brisbane Times", quotes winner Alexis Wright as saying "It took two years to understand how I could write (Carpentaria) and a good six years to write it with a number of early attempts thrown away". She pays tribute to her publisher, Giramondo, who took a risk with the novel when a number of major publishers had passed on the work.
The first I heard of the win last night was on ABC TV's "The 7:30 Report" when it was announced by Kerry O'Brien. This was followed by an interview with the author which you can now read, or watch.
Susan Wyndham, in "The Sydney Morning Herald", quotes judge Morag Fraser about the novel's narrator, who "is very original and very brave - a bit like creating Huckleberry Finn's voice".
