Helen Garner will have to clear a space in her trophy cabinet to accommodate the Queensland Premier’s Literary Award for Fiction. Garner claimed the $25,000 prize, for her novel The Spare Room, at an awards ceremony in Brisbane tonight. Earlier this month, The Spare Room took out the Victorian equivalent, the Vance Palmer Prize.

Text congratulates Helen on another award - further confirmation, if any was needed, that this is a very special book indeed, from one of Australia’s most gifted writers.

Perhaps Peter Carey said it best when we sent him a copy of The Spare Room to read:
‘Helen Garner is a great writer;
The Spare Room is a great book.’