Book of the Year Award
(Previously the Most Underrated Book Award)
SPN presents an annual award known as the ‘Small Press Network Book of the Year Award’. Any book released by an SPN member publisher in the previous calendar year is eligible.
‘We successfully ran the Most Underrated Book Award (MUBA) since 2012, but it was time for a change and refresh,’ says SPN general manager Tim Coronel.
For 2021, a new judging panel came on board: academic Alexandrea Dane, author Penni Russon, editor Jess Gately, and booksellers Marina Sano and Jing Xuan Teo. They read through over 70 entries to come up with a shortlist of six titles. We also recorded a podcast episode with three of the judges where they discuss the judging process.
The prize pool for 2021 increased to $5000 with Bibliotheca joining the Australian Booksellers Association (ABA) and ArtsHub as sponsors.
The award was announced via Instagram Live as part of the Wheeler Centre’s Next Big Thing series on Friday 26 November. In a break from tradition, two books shared the Book of the Year award: Echoes by Shu-Ling Chua and We Are Speaking in Code by Tanya Vavrilova (Brio Books). Click here for more details on the winners.
For any queries about the 2022 award, email us.
The winner of the 2020 Book of the Year is ‘Forgotten Corners: Essays in Search of an Island’s Soul’ by Pete Hay, published by Walleah Press!
The Winner
Forgotten Corners: Essays in Search of an Island’s Soul
Pete Hay is pre-eminent among the guardians of Tasmania’s island’s spirit, his fierce intelligence and compassionate heart resisting those who would ravage, exploit and appropriate its natural beauty, cultural creativity and fraught history for profit and power.
The Shortlist
Forgotten Corners: Essays in Search of an Island’s Soul
The Subjects
Cooee Mittigar: A story on Darug Songlines
blur by the
When One Person Dies the Whole World is Over
Lucky Ticket
Nganajungu Yagu
The MUBA 2019 judges praised the submitted books for their range of vibrant and contrasting voices and genres. The 2019 judging panel of Melissa Cranenburgh, Jane Rawson and Jackie Tang (convenor) highlighted the fact that it is often small presses who take risks and the results—evident in this year’s shortlist—are richly rewarding and worthwhile reads.
