Sonya Louise Hartnett (born 23 March 1968) is an Australian author of fiction for adults, young adults, and children. She has been called "the finest Australian writer of her generation".

Many of Hartnett's books have been published in the UK and in North America. For Thursday's Child (2000; 2002 in the UK), she won the annual Guardian Children's Fiction Prize, a once-in-a-lifetime book award judged by a panel of British children's writers.

Landscape with Animals controversy

In 2006, Hartnett was involved with some controversy regarding the publication of Landscape with Animals, published under the pseudonym Cameron S. Redfern. The book contains many sex scenes and Hartnett was almost immediately "outed" as the author. She said that she wanted to avoid the book being accidentally shelved with her work for children in libraries and denied that she used a pseudonym to evade responsibility for the work or as a publicity stunt à la Nikki Gemmell's The Bride Stripped Bare.

Awards and honours

In 2000 and 2003, The Sydney Morning Herald named Hartnett one of their Young Novelists of the Year.

In 2008, Hartnett received the Astrid Lindgren Memorial Award, which annually honours an author of children's books whose "a body of work known for its unflinching focus on the toughest aspects of life."

In 2016, Shelf Awareness included Golden Boys on their list of the best teen novels of the year.

{| class="wikitable sortable mw-collapsible"

|+Awards for Hartnett's writing

!Year

!Title

!Award

!Result

!Ref.

|-

! rowspan="5" |1996

| rowspan="4" |Sleeping Dogs

|CBCA Children's Book of the Year Award: Older Readers

|Honour

|

|-

|Kathleen Mitchell Award (Australia)

|Winner

|

|-

|New South Wales Premier's Literary Awards

|Shortlist

|

|-

|Victorian Premier's Literary Awards Sheaffer Pen Prize

|Winner

|

|-

|Willful Blue

|IBBY Ena Noel Award (1996)

|Winner

|

|-

!1999

|Princes

|CBCA Children's Book of the Year Award: Older Readers

|Shortlist

|

|-

! rowspan="2" |2000

| rowspan="4" |Thursday's Child

|Aurealis Award for Best Young Adult Novel

|Winner

|

|-

|Australian Publishers Association Award

|Shortlist

|

|-

! rowspan="2" |2001

|CBCA Children's Book of the Year Award: Older Readers

|Shortlist

|

|-

|New South Wales Premier's Literary Awards

|Shortlist

|

|-

! rowspan="4" |2002

|Forest

|CBCA Children's Book of the Year Award: Older Readers

|Winner

|

|-

|Stripes of the Sidestep Wolf

|CBCA Children's Book of the Year Award: Older Readers

|Shortlist

|

|-

| rowspan="2" |Thursday's Child

|Guardian Children's Fiction Prize

|Winner

|

|-

|Commonwealth Writers Prize (South East Asia and South Pacific Region, Best Book)

|Finalist

|

|-

|Miles Franklin Award

|Shortlist

|

|-

|New South Wales Premier's Literary Awards

|Shortlist

|

|-

! rowspan="4" |2005

| rowspan="2" |

|Courier Mail Award for young readers

|Winner

|

|-

|CBCA Children's Book of the Year Award: Younger Readers

|Winner

|

|-

| rowspan="3" |Surrender

|

|Shortlist

|

|-

|Aurealis Award for Best Fantasy Novel

|Shortlist

|

|-

!2006

|Commonwealth Writers Prize (South East Asia and South Pacific Region, Best Book)

|Shortlist

|

|-

! rowspan="2" |2007

|

|COOL Award Fiction for Years 7-9

|Winner

|

|-

|Surrender

|Michael L. Printz Award

|Honour

|

|-

!2008

|The Ghost's Child

|CBCA Children's Book of the Year Award: Older Readers

|Winner

|

|-

! rowspan="3" |2010

|Butterfly

|Miles Franklin Award

|Shortlist

|

|-

|

|Aurealis Award for Best Young Adult Novel

|Finalist

|

|-

|

|Andersen Award (Italy) Best Book for readers 9–12

|Winner

|

|-

!2011

|

|CBCA Children's Book of the Year Award: Older Readers

|Winner

|

|-

! rowspan="3" |2012

| rowspan="2" |Come Down, Cat!

|CBCA Children's Book of the Year Award: Younger Readers

|Honour

|

|-

|Prime Minister's Literary Awards for Children's Fiction

|Finalist

|

|-

|

|CILIP Carnegie Medal

|Shortlist

|

|-

! rowspan="2" |2013

| rowspan="2" |

|CBCA Children's Book of the Year Award: Younger Readers

|Winner

|

|-

|Prime Minister's Literary Awards Young Adult Fiction

|Shortlist

|

|-

! rowspan="5" |2015

| rowspan="5" |Golden Boys

|Christine Stead Prize for Fiction

|Shortlist

|

|-

|Miles Franklin Award

|Shortlist

|

|-

|New South Wales Premier's Literary Awards

|Shortlist

|

|-

|Prime Minister's Literary Awards for Fiction

|Finalist

|

|-

|Victorian Premier's Literary Awards

|Shortlist

|

|-

!2022

|Blue Flower

|CBCA Children's Book of the Year Award: Picture Book

|Shortlist

|

|}

Bibliography

Fiction

Picture books

  • The Boy and the Toy (2010)
  • Come Down, Cat! (2011)
  • Blue Flower (2021)
  • Go Home, Cat! (2022)

Junior fiction

  • The Silver Donkey (2004)
  • Sadie and Ratz (2008)
  • The Children of the King (2012)

Teen and young adult fiction

  • Wilful Blue (1994)
  • produced as a play and performed at the Victorian Arts Centre
  • Sleeping Dogs (1995)
  • The Devil Latch (1996)
  • Princes (1997)
  • All My Dangerous Friends (1998)
  • Stripes of the Sidestep Wolf (1999) (published in the UK in 2004)
  • Thursday's Child (2000) (published in the UK in 2002)
  • Forest (2001)
  • Surrender (2005)
  • The Ghost's Child (2007)
  • Butterfly (2009)
  • The Midnight Zoo (2010)

Adult fiction

  • Trouble All the Way (1984)
  • Sparkle and Nightflower (1986)
  • The Glass House (1990)
  • Black Foxes (1996)
  • Of a Boy (adult, 2002) (first published in the UK as What the Birds See in 2003)
  • Landscape with Animals (2006), as by Cameron S. Redfern
  • Golden Boys (2014)

Memoirs

  • Life in Ten Houses: A Memoir (2013)

Selected critical studies and reviews of Hartnett's work

  • Review of Golden Boys

See also

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References

  • Sonya Hartnett at Penguin Books
  • 2002 interview
  • 2007 interview