The Historical Novel Society Australasia (HNSA) has announced the shortlist for the 2025 ARA Historical Novel Prize. This year’s shortlist for both categories features authors who have published before and are well known to Australian literary audiences.
The ARA Historical Novel Prize gives Australian and New Zealand historical novelists the chance to be recognised in a class of their own. This year, the HNSA is also introducing the ARA Readers’ Choice Award, so readers can vote for their favourite title in the adult category. Find out more and place your vote on the HNSA website.
Discover the titles from the 2025 shortlists below!
Adult Category Shortlist
Dusk
Robbie Arnott
In the distant highlands, a puma named Dusk is killing shepherds. Down in the lowlands, twins Iris and Floyd are out of work, money and friends. When they hear that a bounty has been placed on Dusk, they reluctantly decide to join the hunt.
As they journey up into this wild, haunted country, they discover there's far more to the land and people of the highlands than they imagined. And as they close in on their prey, they're forced to reckon with conflicts both ancient and deeply personal.
A compact format will available from 28 October and can be pre-ordered here.
The First Friend
Malcolm Knox
The Soviet Union 1938: Lavrentiy Beria, 'The Boss' of the Georgian republic, nervously prepares a Black Sea resort for a visit from 'The Boss of Bosses', his fellow Georgian, Josef Stalin. Under escalating pressure from enemies and allies alike, Beria slowly but surely descends into murderous paranoia.
By his side is Vasil Murtov, Beria's closest friend since childhood. But to be a witness is dangerous; Murtov must protect his family and play his own game of survival while remaining outwardly loyal to an increasingly unstable Beria. The tension ramps up as Stalin's visit and the inevitable bloodbath approaches. Is Murtov playing Beria, or is he being played?
I Am Nannertgarrook
Tasma Walton
From her idyllic life in sea country in Nerrm (Port Phillip Bay, Victoria), Nannertgarrook is abducted and taken to a slave market, leaving behind a husband, daughter and son. Pregnant when seized, she soon gives birth to another son, whom she raises with the children of her fellow captives.
Nannertgarrook is separated not only from her Boonwurrung family, but from her birthright – the ceremonies she once was so joyously part of, the majestic whales who are her totem, the land and sky and sea country and its creatures. All these things she loves as deeply as she does her blood kin.
But now, as her reality becomes profoundly different, she must keep that family and her old life alive in her mind. Their rich, pulsating elements sing to us through her beautiful voice, even while Nannertgarrook herself is subjected to the worst of humanity. This sweeping novel asks us to consider who, in colonial history, were the real savages, and what it truly means to be civilised.
Children's Category Shortlist
Moonboy
Anna Ciddor
When a boy called Keith pops up from nowhere in Letty's bedroom and accuses her of invading his room, Letty is astonished – but things get even stranger when she realises she is caught up in an incredible adventure, able to slip back and forth in time!
Keith lives in the world of 1969, and Letty joins in the thrill and excitement of the first astronauts about to land on the moon. But when she discovers her trips to the past are changing history, she starts to worry. What if something she says or does causes a disaster – or even messes up the moon landing?
The Year We Escaped
Suzanne Leal
Europe, 1940. With war on their doorstep, German classmates Klara and Rachel, and French brothers Lucien and Paul, are forced to leave their homes. They are taken to Gurs, a French detention camp in the south-west of France. It's a crowded place, with little comfort and even less food.
When Klara and Rachel are promised safe refuge in a remote French village, Lucien and Paul are anxious to join them – and will risk their own lives to get there.
Filled with adventure, danger and intrigue, this is the story of four unlikely friends desperate to escape from a war that keeps coming closer.
The Midwatch
Judith Rossell
'The city was stuffed full of wickedness, everyone knew that …’
Banished to the Midwatch Institute for Orphans, Runaways and Unwanted Girls, Maggie Fishbone is sure she’s in for a life of drudgery. But she quickly discovers there’s more to the Midwatch than meets the eye ...
The city shimmers with jewels and secrets, and soon Maggie is thrust into an adventure that takes her deep underground, high above the clouds and face to face with danger itself. Turn the page and prepare to be drawn into a lavishly illustrated world, brimming with mystery, unlikely heroines and an adventure as big as the sky.
The winners will be announced on Thursday 16 October. Learn more about the ARA Historical Novel Prize and the judge's comments on the 2025 shortlists here.
