Geraldton writer Serena Moss shortlisted for prestigious WA literary award for raw debut novel Wreckage

A young Geraldton-based writer has been shortlisted for a coveted WA literary award for her manuscript full of grief, guilt and the aftermath of unimaginable loss. Waggrakine resident Serena Moss’ debut novel Wreckage has been shortlisted for the Fogarty Literary Award, established by Fremantle Press, along with three other talented WA authors — Chuckie Raven, Jessica Baker and Seth Malacari. WA authors aged between 18 and 35 can submit unpublished manuscripts of adult fiction, narrative non-fiction or young adult fiction and if shortlisted, go into the running to win $20,000, a publishing contract with Fremantle Press, and a hot desk residency with the Centre for Stories worth $1500. Moss has been writing ever since she can remember but for herself, not for anyone else. As a little girl, she would often take her daily experiences and put them onto a page, transforming each mundane daily activity into a story. Working full-time at Team Sadowski/Nevill Real Estate, the 30-year-old loves nothing more outside of work than to put pen to paper (or fingers to a keyboard) and share stories born from her own struggles or from towns often missed on a map, and the people who live there — gritty, often sad but very real human experiences. Wreckage follows Carter Reynolds — “small-town golden boy, footy hero, supposed-to-be-somebody” — who is the driver in a drunken accident that kills his best friend Jason and leaves himself with no legs, no future, and a small-town that unsure what to do with him. “It’s about the aftermath. What do you do now that the worst thing has happened — and it’s you. It’s not about what’s happened to you or what you’ve done, it’s about what you do and who you become moving forward,” Moss said. “I was writing for myself. I was processing all these things that happened to me — domestic violence, miscarriages, trauma — and I was putting that into these characters, and I’ve tweaked with it and played with it and actually made those scenes into something that’s gone into this manuscript. “(Wreckage) was this raw, feral, fragmented scraps of scenes and things... but I really felt like there was a story. “So you get that heart, you get that grief. It’s real because it’s there. It happened. It’s just been repurposed to something else.” Inspired by Australian authors Bryce Courtney, Emily Paull and Geraldton’s Holden Sheppard, Moss said she submitted her 62,000-word manuscript two minutes before entries closed, saying she had “nothing to lose” and was at work when she got the call that she had been shortlisted. “I made this noise, and I ran to the nearest reading room — like I scurried. I was just stunned, absolutely shell-shocked,” she said. If she were to win, Moss said she would, first and foremost, give back to local libraries. “I would like to make a difference . . . I’d love to be able to donate some copies of it and put it into libraries, because I know their funding is just not the greatest,” she said. The Fogarty Literary Award winner will be announced at a special event at Perth’s Government House on Tuesday, June 3, 2025.