Tara June Winch has been named the winner of the 2020 Voss Literary Prize for The Yield.

Knowing that he will soon die, Albert ‘Poppy’ Gondiwindi takes pen to paper. His life has been spent on the banks of the Murrumby River at Prosperous House, on Massacre Plains, and he is now determined to pass on the language of his people and everything that was ever remembered. His granddaughter, August Gondiwindi, is on the other side of the world when she learns of his death. At her bittersweet homecoming, she learns that Prosperous is to be repossessed by a mining company. The Yield is the story of a people and a culture dispossessed, but it also a powerful reclaiming of Indigenous language, storytelling and identity.

Launched in 2014, the Voss Literary Prize is awarded to the best novel published in Australia in the previous year, and is dedicated to the memory of historian Vivian Robert Le Vaux Voss. As the winner, Winch will receive $5000.

The judges commented: ‘In its broad canvas this novel dramatises the often heart-breaking complexities of Australia’s colonial past and colonial present. The Yield emerges proudly from an Indigenous perspective and delivers a vivid picture of the way that memories flow through Indigenous families and communities and shape presentday realities.’

Winch was joined on the shortlist by Alex Landragin, Andrew McGahan, Mohammed Massoud Morsi, Meg Mundell and Carrie Tiffany. Find the full shortlist here.