FOUR books relating to Australian military, social and war history have been announced by the Australian War Memorial as shortlisted finalists for the Les Carlyon Literary Prize.

The $10,000 prize is named in honour of the late historian, author and journalist Les Carlyon, who was a member of the Council of the Australian War Memorial from May, 2006, until his passing in March, 2019.

War Memorial director Matt Anderson, described Carlyon as “a master storyteller who made a lifelong contribution to both Australian journalism and literature. Through his impeccable research and readability, Carlyon brought Australian military history to an entirely new audience.”

War Memorial head of military history Karl James said the subject matter of this year’s entries had ranged from frontier violence to recent conflicts. The bulk had been non-fiction with strong representation from veterans, family historians, journalists and academics.

The prize was established in 2020 a way to support both emerging and established military or war history writers and to find and to encourage the best storytellers in Australia

Anderson said the judging panel had considered literary merit, the contribution of the work to understanding the Australian experience of war and conflict, authenticity and credibility, and originality.

The winner will be announced on November 22.

The four shortlisted works chosen from more than 30 works submitted are:

• Xavier Fowler, “Not Playing the Game: Sport and Australia’s Great War”, Melbourne University Press
• Stephen Gapps, “Gudyarra: The First Wiradyuri War of Resistance, 1822-1824”, NewSouth Books
• Christine Helliwell, “Semut”, Penguin Books Australia
• Ben McKelvey, “Mosul: Australia’s secret war inside the ISIS caliphate”, Hachette Australia