Discover millions of ebooks, audiobooks, and so much more with a free trial

Only $11.99/month after trial. Cancel anytime.

Newcastle Short Story Award 2016
Newcastle Short Story Award 2016
Newcastle Short Story Award 2016
Ebook233 pages4 hours

Newcastle Short Story Award 2016

Rating: 0 out of 5 stars

()

Read preview

About this ebook

Featuring the top 32 works selected by the judges, Dr Michael Sala and Glenys Osborne, this anthology is the result of the national competition awarding over $5000 in prizes.

LanguageEnglish
Release dateNov 28, 2016
ISBN9780987316899
Newcastle Short Story Award 2016
Author

Hunter Writers Centre

Hunter Writers Centre is a not-for-profit, incorporated organisation established in 1995. We are a leading literary centre in Australia committed to developing and supporting the artistic and professional development of aspiring and established writers. We publish more anthologies of Australian writers than any other writers centre in the country. We coordinate annual, national writing competitions of high calibre and publish the shortlist in a print and e-anthology. The 3 national writing competitions we conduct, offering over $30 000 in prize money, are: The Newcastle Poetry Prize; The Newcastle Short Story Award; Grieve - poems and stories in honour of grief awareness month.

Read more from Hunter Writers Centre

Related to Newcastle Short Story Award 2016

Related ebooks

Anthologies For You

View More

Related articles

Reviews for Newcastle Short Story Award 2016

Rating: 0 out of 5 stars
0 ratings

0 ratings0 reviews

What did you think?

Tap to rate

Review must be at least 10 words

    Book preview

    Newcastle Short Story Award 2016 - Hunter Writers Centre

    Newcastle Short Story Award

    Anthology 2016

    First published in Australia in 2016 by

    Hunter Writers Centre

    www.hunterwriterscentre.org

    Newcastle Short Story Award Anthology 2016

    ISBN-13: 978-0-9873168-9-9

    Cover illustration by Peter Lewis

    Design and typsetting by Jemimah Irvin

    Published by Hunter Writers Centre Inc. 2016

    © Each short story is copyright of the respective author

    © This collection copyright of Hunter Writers Centre

    All rights reserved

    No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form by any means electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise without the prior consent of the publishers.

    Table of Contents

    Judges' Foreword

    Not Inside the Fish

    Lynne Cook

    Winner Newcastle Short Story Award 2016

    Wrench

    Rafael S.W

    Second Prize awarded by Leah Jay

    Absolution

    Melanie Zolenas-Kennedy

    Highly Commended awarded by Tower Cinemas

    Seabird

    Llewellyn Brown

    Highly Commended awarded by Tower Cinemas

    The Ducks

    Craig Billingham

    Commended awarded by Harry Hartog Booksellers

    Number Eight

    Ewa Ramsey

    Commended awarded by Foghorn Brewhouse

    Nineteen

    Dominic Carew

    Commended awarded by Maclean’s Booksellers

    Two Sundays in October

    Shaynah Andrews

    Local Award awarded by Novotel Hotels & Resorts, Newcastle Beach

    The Butter Knife

    Jazzua Andrews

    Local Award awarded by Hunter Valley Gardens

    Homesick

    Alexandra O’Sullivan

    Thunder-Struck

    Nikki McWatters

    Likes to Measure

    Vahri McKenzie

    Summer

    Llewellyn Horgan

    The Track

    Sean Crawley

    Wake

    Stephanie Holm

    The Front Porch

    Luke Boulton

    The Man Next Door

    Jonathan Hadwen

    The Bends (or on the suffering of others)

    William Stanforth

    The Land of Always Living

    Claire Bradshaw

    A Brief Interview

    Jennifer Mills

    Don't You Think I Deserve That

    Ashley Goldberg

    Beside Myself

    Maree Gallop

    Stingrays

    Christine Kearney

    Perhaps Everything is Fiction

    Mandy Beaumont

    Death, Sex and Kingswoods

    James Turvey

    Just Add Water

    Darcy-Lee Tindale

    Orpheus and Eurydice

    David Graham

    North of Eden

    Ellena Savage

    The Red Wallpaper

    Elianna Han

    Kintsukuroi

    Emily Riches

    Mad Dog Woman

    Marcelle McDonald

    Heart Murmurs

    Joanna Nell

    About the Illustrator and Designer

    About Hunter Writers Centre

    Project Partners

    Judges’ Foreword

    Judging the stories in a competition such as this is both easy and difficult. It is not so much a process of discovering the stories that grip and engage and startle as it is of letting those stories discover you. A writer’s voice comes out in the first paragraph, often the first line. It seems effortless, belying the years of practice that have gone into making it so—not to mention the countless drafts that go into making a story work. The story has you, and you find yourself reading on without realising you’ve made the decision. But deciding which is the better of two very good stories? That’s the difficult part. It comes down to the way the opening translates into the world of the story—the details, the events, how these are shaped around the theme at the heart of it , what you are left with at the end, and the way you go back a second time and read the same details differently.

    All of the winners and commended entries in this collection had an impact on the judges. There was rousing debate over style and structure and voice, and over the relative strength of a first reading compared with a second or third or fourth. What struck us most about these stories was the breadth of vision not only in theme but also in style and structure, from the surreal yet truthful emotional drama underpinning ‘Wrench’, which hurtles the reader through five tension-filled years of the narrator’s life, to the evocation of J. D. Salinger’s most famous short story in ‘The Ducks’. From the interlacing of a traumatic past and present in ‘Number Eight’ to the evocative sense of accrued past captured in ‘Absolution’. From the deceptively humorous magic realism of ‘Seabird’ to the irresistibly uplifting trajectory and closing image of ‘Nineteen’. And then there is the winner, ‘Not inside the Fish’, which feels both timely and timeless in its depiction of masculinity, violence and ambivalence.

    Any of the writers who have made it into this collection will hopefully feel as thrilled as we are to see their stories here, and in such good company. In a large field of entries, standing out is an achievement.

    We commend Hunter Writers Centre for continuing their work publishing Australian writing. Well known for co-ordinating the Newcastle Poetry Prize, awarded by the University of Newcastle, this small but vibrant writers’ centre now brings you this anthology by talented short story writers of Australia.

    Glenys Osborne & Dr Michael Sala

    2016 Newcastle Short Story Award

    Not Inside the Fish

    Lynne Cook

    Winner Newcastle Short Story Award 2016

    His mother had offered Jonas her car, just to the shops, as though he might go for an extended joyride in a 2006 Mazda 2. Lately her conversation was heavy on references to the slippery slope of middle age and how she would need more help from certain children. So sweeten him up, the old one-two. Good god, Jonas thought and then wondered who said good god any more. Not a guy of twenty one.

    And if he was twenty one she had to be closing in on fifty which was hardly an urgent case for assisted care living. One thing he could say about his stepdad, apart from the fact that paternity didn’t force much of a pattern into the family mosaic, was that the old man was bald enough to look his age. He’d taken a retirement package, apparently so he could spend more time washing and polishing the Mazda. That was until the old bloke had discovered the Northern Suburbs Men’s Shed. The Shed had become the guy’s home-away-from-home, secret old men’s business, but Jonas didn’t begrudge him that. Jonas had found himself a share house in Newtown twelve months ago. He missed regular meals and functioning laundry facilities but it cut down the travelling. It had been time to be his own man.

    But here he was; a late Saturday morning, he was twenty one and his mother had just self-diagnosed early onset Huntingdon’s. Tied to the wheel of a Mazda 2, he was headed for Coles like a man at the mercy of a greater power. Which he was, of course. Where were his step-sisters when they were needed, for god’s sake?

    Jonah indicated right at the intersection and slipped down another gear as the underground car park ramp sucked him into darkness. He cruised along the parking bays, decelerated to walking pace and with a degree of malice edged his way into the first car space close to a pillar. He wished for a moment his mother knew about the danger to her car door. He turned off the engine.

    The place was a vast neon-lit cave of cars; four-wheel-drives dwarfing ordinary sedans. The usual bully-boy Land Rovers spread themselves across two spaces, leaving Hyundais and Mitsubishis to inhale themselves into what was left. Above, high intensity lights broke up the dark but left pockets of twilight. A few trolleys had been dumped in car spaces when shoppers had lost the spirit to walk fifteen metres back to the trolley bays. Jonas knew how they felt. He watched as people walked past; a bloke in board shorts ruffled a kid’s hair, a boy tried to pull its mother’s arm from its socket.

    Families, who’d have them?

    His was ordinary enough, Jonas thought. Take one divorced man, his two daughters by different women; an engine and two carriages rattling along the tracks. Toot-toot, pull into the station a few years later and his mother hooks on, dragging a Jonas-shaped caboose. That was years ago. Jonas didn’t remember much of the time with his real dad.

    People always asked Jonas where the name came from. His unlamented late father, he usually answered. A Bible-basher with a whale fetish? His stepsisters enjoyed the joke. No, an off-his-face footballer arrested after a failed ATM ram-raid; a bloke with a bad sense of humour and even worse impulse control. So his mother told him; no more under the thumb for her.

    Errin called Jonas her Clark Kent, and sometimes her Lone Ranger. She was always looking for the heroic in him. She traced a mask around his eyes with the warm tip of her finger.

    Jonas put his hand on the car door.

    And now he wanted to fling it open, smash it hard against the pillar, leave the car unlocked and walk away.

    He couldn’t get Errin out of his head. If she had come back last night like she said, things would be different. For a start he would have had an excuse when his mother rang and he wouldn’t be sitting here swallowed up in the darkness. He got out of the car and joined the other shoppers heading towards the escalators; a queue of ghouls, heads lowered, greyed by the artificial light. Countdown to zombie mayhem, he thought.

    Errin would’ve laughed at that.

    Last night he hadn’t known what was going to happen, what he really felt. Errin stood in front of him, her mouth open. She had wanted to go out. He didn’t. That was cool. She would go without him.

    Anger had been buried in him all along. It’d probably been flowing through his veins since birth, a dormant virus ready to burst out the moment he felt vulnerable. Errin made him feel vulnerable. He didn’t want anything more than he wanted her. They were facing one another when the walls fell in on him. By the time he blinked away the hurt, he knew his hand was a red-hot fist eager at his shoulder.

    Errin didn’t move. He’d dropped his arm and tried to speak. Nothing came out. She had stared at him like she didn’t know who he was. Finally she said she’d be back later but she hadn’t come. He’d gone to bed alone and it felt like a lifetime.

    He joined the crowd on the escalator. A girl was ahead of him, her skinny arms wrangling two toddlers who already had her house-trained. He felt sorry for her and felt sorry for the kids. They had it all ahead of them. One of the kids turned to him and grinned, its finger stuck up its nose.

    Jonas needed a coffee. The waitress was busy with banked up orders. When his take-away coffee arrived, Jonas stayed put. Opposite him the check-outs were flowing smoothly. Strangers seemed determined to be friendly. Have a good day, all of you, he thought. He saw his little family from the escalator, the young mother and the two kids, making their way into another aisle. The two kids already had lollypops gluing their lips shut. Forget the Tooth Fairy, you two. He got up and left his half-drunk coffee at the counter.

    Jonas made record time with the shopping list. His mother was cutting down on meat but he popped in a packet of sausages for the old man, as full of fat as he find. In the bakery section he spotted an iced cake chock full of trans-fat goodness and took that too. But on second thoughts he left the sausages and cake at the register. The check-out chick wasn’t impressed.

    He could feel the pressure building. Forget the Huntingdon’s. Forget everything. He had to get back to Newtown fast. Errin might be home.

    Jonas heads back down underground. He shoves the trolley off the escalator, drops the grocery bags and rams the trolley back into the bay. Three bags in each hand, he heads across the rows of cars.

    There is shouting somewhere ahead; disembodied voices. Maybe he’s imagining the sound but Jonas drops his chin to his chest and feels every other shopper doing the same. Just don’t look up.

    There really is a guy screaming at someone and it’s close.

    Jonas’ hands go icy. He reaches the Mazda and tries not to look around. The shouting is a few cars away.

    His hands fumble with the car key. He fumbles with the lock. He’s fumbling still when he throws the groceries into the back seat, gets in and locks the doors. He winds the window down a fraction.

    There is naked rage out there. A young guy, masked by his hoodie, is screaming at a car window. The guy’s body is jerking, wiry and frantic, live with a current of fury. He’s jabbing his fist at the glass.

    ‘Stay in the car, bitch!’

    ‘Let me out!’

    ‘Get back in the fucking car! Get back in the fucking car, I said!’

    The hooded guy turns and starts to walk away, his feet like loaded springs.

    A girl, her voice a screech of chalk, emerges from the car behind him. Jonas can see it like on a movie screen.

    ‘You can’t leave me here!’

    The guy turns.

    ‘Get back in the car, cunt! Do as you’re told!’

    The girl, skinny and hooded too, faces him off. They bounce back and forward like cartoon figures.

    ‘Give me my wallet! I want to get out of here!’ The girl screams at him. The raw edge of fear is in her voice.

    The guy raises his fist and lunges.

    She makes a break for it.

    The girl runs for the exit. She takes cover behind the next row of cars but the guy blocks her each time, jinking from side to side. She props and falters. He closes in.

    He has her by the shoulder and is trying to get a proper swing in.

    ‘Get back to the car, bitch! Just get in the car.’

    The girl has a burst of adrenaline. She springs away from the guy.

    Jonas has seen the chase on Africa wildlife docos. She’s the gazelle, her shattered hips will drag her down.

    Other shoppers emerge from the escalator. They scatter at the screams, their trolleys clash together and they run for their cars.

    The hooded guy holds a knife high like a sceptre. One older bloke, calm and stoic, stops at the sight of it and backs away.

    The girl has run full circle and disappears to his right behind the Mazda. Jonas cranes around. Then her face pops up, plastered to the passenger side window. Her mouth is an O. Her eyes are pleading, dead things. He fumbles for the lock and mouths to her, Get in.

    But the guy walks up to the bonnet, grinning at Jonas. The knife is casual in his hand.

    Jonas grabs at the central locking, locks the door again.

    Shit, shit, he thinks. No, open them. Get the girl inside.

    The guy is screaming obscenities.

    She’s just screaming. Jonas can hear it all, you piggy in the middle, you coward. Then, for a second, all Jonas can think is, don’t scratch the duco, Mum’ll kill me. The guy smashes his fist on the Mazda bonnet and the girl runs again.

    The guy is all lion now.

    The other shoppers have vanished like rats down drains.

    He grabs his phone and dials triple O. He stares with disbelief. No reception, not underground. Then he drops the phone.

    Jonas reverses at speed and screeches onto the exit ramp. In a few seconds it’s behind him, the sky is blue again. He is above water.

    Jonas thinks of Errin.

    He swerves to the side of the road and double parks.

    He tries triple O again and a calm voice answers.

    ‘Police, please. An assault is . . . um . . . happening.’

    He’s asked for the location. He’s asked if there are children involved.

    He gives descriptions.

    ‘The police are on their way,’ the woman tells him. He falls in love with her voice.

    The silver flood of adrenaline ebbs but his forearms shake on the wheel.

    The woman speaks again. ‘Thank you, sir, for taking the time to report this.’

    ‘Thank you,’ he says in return. ‘Thank you.’

    After a while Jonas indicates his way back into the traffic. He finds a park twenty metres up the road and pulls in again. He picks up his mobile once more and rings the familiar number.

    No one picks up. His call goes to voice mail.

    But he leaves a message. He drives home and unloads the groceries. Together he and his mother fill the fridge and cupboards. His mother is getting a headache. He offers to make

    Enjoying the preview?
    Page 1 of 1