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The Time We Have Taken by Steven Carroll (Fourth Estate) is the winner of this year's Miles Franklin Literary Award.

Carroll receives the award, valued at $42,000, at a gala dinner held in Sydney this evening. ‘It's an extraordinary thrill and honour,' the author said of his win, but added that it was ‘also daunting to be joining a long list of authors whom you've either studied or admired for years'.

‘The Miles Franklin comes with the gravitas of a whole literary tradition and you feel that weight almost instantly.'

The Time We Have Taken is the third in a trilogy that includes The Art of the Engine Driver and The Gift of Speed, both of which were shortlisted for the prestigious award in previous years.

The judging panel--professor Robert Dixon, professor Morag Fraser AM, Ian Hicks, Lesley McKay and Regina Sutton--described Carroll's novel as ‘a poised, philosophically profound exploration' and ‘a stand-alone work that is moving and indelible in its evocation of the extraordinary in ordinary lives'.

Publisher Linda Funnell said it was ‘tremendously exciting to see this recognition of Steven Carroll'. 

'The Miles Franklin is one award that certainly does give a significant kick to sales,' Funnell told WBN. 'For an author like Steve, who has to date sold modestly, it is a career-making award.'

Funnell said HarperCollins will be 'meeting immediately to plan reissues of the backlist titles The Art of the Engine Driver and The Gift of Speed'. 

'While The Time We Have Taken can definitely be read on its own, we anticipate that once readers have had a taste of Steven Carroll's world, they will want more,' she said. 'I'm happy to say we have plenty of stock available.'

Funnell said the Miles Franklin 'remains Australia's best-known and most prestigious literary award, and brings with it a unique opportunity to introduce Steve's work to a wider audience'. 

‘The Time We Have Taken counterpoints the story of a family with that of a community--and a nation--also undergoing great change. It is rich, lyrical and profound. In taking suburban life as his setting, Steven Carroll does what great novelists do: he holds a mirror up to the familiar, and reveals it to us afresh, challenging us to look again.'

Carroll's novel beat 59 other titles to win the prize, including the four other shortlisted titles--The Fern Tattoo (David Brooks, UQP); Landscape of Farewell (Alex Miller, A&U); Love Without Hope (Rodney Hall, Picador); Sorry (Gail Jones, Vintage).

In August Carroll will tour Western Australia as part of the Miles Franklin touring program, supported by Copyright Agency Limited. Details for the tour will be available in July at www.trust.com.au/awards/miles_franklin.

The Miles Franklin is awarded for ‘the novel of the year which is of the highest literary merit and which presents Australian life in any of its phases.' It was first awarded in 1957 to Patrick White for his novel Voss,

Carpentaria by Alexis Wright (Giramondo) was the winner of last year's award.

The Nelson Meers Foundation is the patron for the Miles Franklin Literary Award.

http://www.booksellerandpublisher.com.au/articles/2008/06/08607/

This article from Thorpe Bowker's Weekly Book Newsletter and Media Extra is reproduced by kind permission of Thorpe-Bowker, a division of R R Bowker LLC. © Copyright 2008, Thorpe-Bowker

Tags: miles franklin award, steven carroll