Tonight in Sydney, Australian Independent Booksellers, announced The Natural Way of Things by Charlotte Wood as their favourite Australian book from last year and the winner of The Indie Book Awards 2016 Book of the Year.
The individual category winners in Fiction, Debut Fiction, Non-Fiction, Children’s and Young Adult were also announced. From these five category winners, the independent booksellers selected the best of the best - The Indie Book of the Year for 2016.
The Indie Book Awards are now considered the forerunners of all major Australian book awards. Since its inception in 2008, the Indie Book Awards have chosen Breath by Tim Winton, The Happiest Refugee by Anh Do, Jasper Jones by Craig Silvey, All That I Am by Anna Funder, The Light Between Oceans by M.L. Stedman, The Narrow Road to the Deep North by Richard Flanagan and The Bush by Don Watson as previous overall winners.
Upon announcement, Charlotte Wood said, “I’m so thrilled to win this prize, and to be shortlisted among so many of our country’s finest writers. None of my books would have had a life without the years of support I’ve had from Australian independent booksellers. My writing life is made possible by these avid readers and recommenders of books, and I’m profoundly grateful.”
“In thinking about Australia’s independent booksellers, it struck me that you are like that seed vault. You are storehouses for the kernels not only of our literary culture but our history, our music, our food culture, our health and legal and technological culture, our visual arts, our politics. You are the safety vault for the seeds of our country’s cultural and intellectual life, and your customers are the spreaders of those seeds out in the world.”
“I am so very, very touched by this award, and so grateful.”
According to Galina Marinov, National Group Manager, Leading Edge Books, “We are hugely proud to announce The Natural Way of Things by Charlotte Wood as the 2016 Indie Book Awards Book of the Year. On the independents bestsellers’ list since publication in October last year, The Natural Way of Things embodies all the qualities of an ‘indie’ winner - a gripping, imaginative and compulsively readable novel; a brave, timely and thought-provoking book that challenges our society’s darkest traits. Hand-sold over the counters, read, re-read and discussed at book clubs and events all over the country, Charlotte Wood’s gritty and powerful novel is a fine addition to the Indie Books Awards winners’ list.”
Allen & Unwin commented: “Everyone at Allen & Unwin is thrilled that Charlotte Wood’s extraordinary novel The Natural Way of Things has been so honoured by the independent booksellers of Australia. From the moment this manuscript landed on our desks we knew we had something very special, a novel of huge power and originality, and a book whose time had surely come. We also felt charged with the responsibility of making sure that it would reach as many readers as possible, and went about doing that with the passion that great literature inspires. Crucial to that mission were the brilliant, tireless independent booksellers of Australia who wholeheartedly embraced The Natural Way of Things and did all they could to get it into as many of their customers’ hands as possible. A huge thank you to the wonderful booksellers of the Leading Edge group for being the best friends a book could have, and for further honouring Charlotte with this great award. And many congratulations to Charlotte for writing this stunning and transformative novel that we are so proud to publish.”
The Indie Book Awards 2016 Category Award winners are:
FICTION
The Natural Way of Things by Charlotte Wood (Allen & Unwin)
NON-FICTION
Reckoning: A Memoir by Magda Szubanski (Text Publishing)
DEBUT FICTION
Salt Creek by Lucy Treloar (Pan Macmillan)
CHILDREN’S
The Bad Guys, Episode 1 by Aaron Blabey (Scholastic Australia)
YOUNG ADULT’S
Cloudwish by Fiona Wood (Pan Macmillan)
The Indie Book Awards 2016 would like to gratefully acknowledge the Category Sponsors of the Indie Book Awards 2016 campaign: Allen & Unwin, NewSouth Books, Hachette Australia, HaperCollins Children’s Books Australia and Hardie Grant Egmont and also the Awards Partners: Pan Macmillan, Simon & Schuster, Books+Publishing, Mercury Creative and Bien Catering.