The Australian/Vogel’s Literary Award is for an unpublished manuscript by a writer under the age of 35. It comes with $20,000 in prizemoney and publication of the winning novel.

This year’s award has been announced and the winner is Paul D. Carter for his ‘Eleven seasons’.

Previous winners are some of the most admired writers of contemporary Australian fiction: Tim Winton, Kate Grenville, Gillian Mears and Andrew McGahan.

‘Melbourne, 1985. Jason Dalton sits on his bed and counts his football cards, dreaming of the day he too is immortalised in the public eye. He’s young and gifted, a natural player who can do anything with the ball in his hand. If only everything else in his life was as obvious to him as playing.

Gold Coast, 1991. The bottom has fallen out of Jason’s life; he’s now a high-school dropout, tired and wasted on the Gold Coast, with an explosive family secret still ringing in his ears. He needs to get his life back. But first he needs to find out who he is.’

Paul D. Carter was born in Melbourne and spent much of his youth going to Collingwood Football matches with his Dad and brother, Marcus. In 2001, Paul completed a Bachelor of Arts with honours from Deakin University and, in 2008 completed a PhD while writing Eleven Seasons.

In writing Eleven Seasons, Paul was able to integrate his own experience of growing up in Melbourne in the 1980s with his keen interest in modern Australian history. He is especially interested in the sociological aspects of AFL and sport in society, in particular its sometimes fraught relationship with women. Paul currently teaches English and Creative Writing to secondary students in the western suburbs, as part of the Teach for Australia Programme.