Image: Tom Doig
Laura Jean McKay is the author of The Animals in That Country (Scribe 2020) - winner of the prestigious Arthur C Clarke Award, The Victorian Prize for Literature, the ABIA Small Publishers Adult Book of the Year and co-winner of the Aurealis Award for Best Science Fiction Novel 2021. The Animals in That Country has been shortlisted for The Stella Prize and longlisted for the Miles Franklin Award. The novel is one of Readings Best Australian Books of the 21st Century.
Laura is also the author of Holiday in Cambodia (Black Inc., 2013) and her latest collection is Gunflower (Scribe 2023), shortlisted for the 2024 Queensland Literary Awards and named one of The Guardian’s best books of 2023.
An Adjunct Lecturer in Creative Writing at Massey University, she also serves on the Australasian Animal Studies committee, and the advisory boards for Animal Studies Journal and Headland literary journal. She was awarded the NZSA Waitangi Day Literary Honours in 2022.
Laura gratefully acknowledges the First Nations people of Meeanjin Country - Yagara people and Turrbal people. She pays her deepest respect to Elders of these Countries and their connections to land, river and community, as well as to First Nations people across the continent.
Laura’s current work has been assisted by the Australian Government through the Australia Council, its arts funding and advisory body.