Some time in the middle of the first decade of the 21st century, 17-year-old Kristina Ross became “one of the youngest actors ever selected” to enrol in the Drama School of the Victorian College of the Arts. Her experiences so shaped, reshaped, made and unmade her that many years later she reconfigured them as fiction.
The resulting novel, First Year, has been awarded the Australian/Vogel Literary Award for Young Writers (aged 35 and under) – becoming its final winner. The award, founded in 1980, has now closed, though the Australian’s book editor has indicated it will rise again with new sponsorship.
