Lenora Thaker’s debut novel, *The Pearl of Tagai Town*, has earned the top prize at the Queensland literary awards (QLAs), receiving the $30,000 Queensland premier’s award for a work of state significance. Inspired by her ancestors’ experiences in Cairns-Malay Town, a segregated shantytown in far north Queensland, the historical novel explores a diverse community of Indigenous Australians, Chinese, Indian, Japanese, Malaysian, and Sri Lankan residents who were separated from the white population from the late 1800s until the 1950s.
Judges described Thaker’s novel as “unambiguously and distinctively Queensland,” praising its vivid sense of place and richly developed characters. The book incorporates multiple Allan languages in an innovative manner, providing fresh perspectives on a largely overlooked chapter of Queensland’s history. The awards ceremony took place Thursday evening at Brisbane Powerhouse during the Brisbane Writers Festival.
In the $15,000 fiction category, Claire Thomas won for *On Not Climbing Mountains*, a novel following a woman’s journey in Switzerland as she copes with grief while researching historical figures connected to the region. The nonfiction prize went to Australian-Palestinian writer Micaela Sahhar for *Find Me at the Jaffa Gate: An Encyclopaedia of a Palestinian Family*, which examines the impact of the Nakba—the displacement of over 700,000 Palestinians during Israel’s establishment in 1948—on her family. Sahhar had previously won the Victorian premier’s literary award for the same work.
The children’s book category was won by *Once I Was a Giant* by Zeno Sworder. The illustrated story—also recognized at the Australian Book Industry Awards and the Victorian premier’s literary awards—tells the tale of a tree transformed into a pencil that writes its own narrative. Other winners included Julianne Negri’s *The Belly of a Wolf* (young adult), Helena Pantsis’s short story collection *Mother Salad*, and Eunice Andrada’s poetry collection *Kontra*. The people’s choice award went to Sita Walker’s *In a Common Hour*, a debut novel set over one hour at a state high school. Walker is a longtime English teacher in Brisbane’s south-east.
The Queensland literary awards, established in 1999 and originally called the Queensland premier’s literary awards until their abolition in 2012, were revived by Queensland’s literary community and administered by the State Library of Queensland from 2014 until 2025. That year, the awards became embroiled in controversy after Arts Minister John-Paul Langbroek intervened to block a $15,000 fellowship from being awarded to First Nations author KA Ren Wyld. The intervention followed a social media post by Wyld concerning the late Hamas leader Yahya Sinwar. Wyld characterized the post as made in an “emotional moment” and stated that her manuscript was unrelated to Gaza. The decision prompted the resignation of 12 judges and delayed the awards the following year. Management of the QLAs was subsequently transferred to the Brisbane Writers Festival starting this year.