Recapping the 2025 Scarlet Stiletto Awards

Summary

In this episode of the Kill City Podcast, hosts Leigh Dillon and Helen delve into the 2025 Scarlet Stiletto Awards, a prestigious event celebrating women's contributions to crime and mystery writing in Australia. They discuss the history of the Sisters in Crime organization, highlight the winners of this year's awards, and explore the diverse categories and emerging voices in the literary scene. The episode concludes with a teaser for future discussions, including the upcoming Ned Kelly Awards and interviews with notable authors.

 Takeaways

• The Scarlet Stiletto Awards celebrate women's crime writing in Australia.
• Sisters in Crime has been active since 1991, promoting female authors.
• Over 5,000 stories have been submitted to the awards over the years.
• Dr. Sandra Tom Jones won the first prize for her clever story.
• Nettie Hilton and Jackie Horswood also received recognition for their unique stories.
• The awards include various categories, showcasing diverse talent.
• Young writers like Amber Woodburn are emerging in the crime genre.
• The podcast highlights the importance of short stories in literature.
• Future episodes will feature discussions on the Ned Kelly Awards.
• The hosts emphasize the value of supporting women's voices in crime fiction.

Books and things we talked about

17th Cut of the Scarlet Stilettos - eBook

Sisters in Crime website

Melbourne Writers Festival website

Chapters

00:00 Introduction to the Scarlet Stiletto Awards
04:17 Celebrating Winners and Prizes
13:32 Spotlight on Winning Stories and Authors
17:24 Looking Ahead: The Ned Kelly Awards

Keywords

Scarlet Stiletto Awards, Sisters in Crime, women's crime writing, Australian authors, short stories, crime fiction, literary awards, emerging writers, podcast, book recommendations

Disclaimer

The episode transcripts are auto-generated, and while all efforts are made to ensure their accuracy, there may be some instance of incorrect spelling and/or errors in the accuracy.

Disclaimer

The episode transcripts are auto-generated, and while all efforts are made to ensure their accuracy, there may be some instance of incorrect spelling and/or errors in the accuracy.

www.killcitypodcast.com.au

Transcript

Helen 0:00

The Kill City Podcast acknowledges the traditional custodians of the lands we're on. Here in Melbourne, that's the Wurrundjeri Woi Worong people of the Kulin Nation. We honour their deep connection to storytelling, a tradition carried across more than 2,000 generations. Pay our respects to elders past, present and emerging, and we extend that acknowledgement to First Nations people listening today.

Leigh 0:49

And as always, I'm joined by Helen.

Helen 0:52

In this episode, we're stepping into the world of the 2025 Scarlet Stiletto Awards. Now, this is Australia's signature prize celebrating women, crime, and mystery writers. The awards run by the Sisters in Crime Association, spotlight sharp, original, and sort of office often deliciously dark short fiction by Australian women, and they've really become a launch pad for some of the most exciting voices in the genre. Now, Leigh, I know you're a huge fan of these awards. But for our listeners who may not be aware, who are the Sisters in Crime and what are the Scarlet Stiletto Awards exactly?

Leigh 1:29

Well, Sisters in Crime have been around since 1991, and their plot is to celebrate women's crime writing on the page and screen and bring a collective critical eye to the field. So the Australian chapter launched at the Feminist Book Festival in Melbourne in September 1991, was inspired by the American organization obviously by the same name, which was actually founded by Sarah Perezky, who was the creator of VI Warkowski, which I think Kathleen Turner may have played in a movie many, many, many moons ago. But essentially their motive is to share the collective passion, their collective passion for women's crime writing. And the Scarlet Stiletto Awards are their premier short story award. They have two or three awards that uh they they get behind each year. Scarlet Siletto's being the short story, and then there's also the Davitt Awards as well. Over the years, uh the Scarlet Stilettos have been won by some really high-profile writers, um, Kate Kennedy, Tara Moss, Angela Savage, Aofie Clifford, Elly Mahony, Josephine Pennicott, and Anna Snoekstra. And um it's a remarkable achievement because over the lifetime of the awards there have been more than 5,000. I think the actual number is like 5,077. Um, and 34 of those Scarlet Stiletto trophy and category winners have gone off to actually have books published, which is you know, it's a remarkable effort. So um each year they do um an ebook. Uh so last year's been the 17th cut of that. Um the ebook is a collection of the winning stories. It's a really good price, it's like five bucks from their website, and it is worth every cent. So well worth having a look at. And there's just been some like uh the the stories this year were just fantastic.

Helen 3:30

Yeah, that's crazy. Five thousand stories that have come through, and all those names of the people. So I think getting on the bandwagon now is fantastic, and five bucks. Seriously, you can't buy a coffee in Melbourne for that, can you, Leigh?

Leigh 3:43

That is absolutely as somebody who drinks a lot of coffee. That is uh you are 100% spot on.

Helen 3:48

So can you tell us who walked away with the wins on the night?

Leigh 3:52

Yeah, sure. So this year's winner taking out the first prize uh in the 32nd um Scarlet Stiletto Award. So it's $2,000 uh plus a trophy was Dr. Sandra Thom Jones from Heelsville in Victoria with her story. And now I know you've got German heritage, so I I may need you to help me out here. De Holle Rache. De Holle Rache. I don't know, maybe can you help me out here? Um because I think you can't you did a pretty good job, Leigh.

Helen 4:23

And I have to admit, I've never actually lived in Germany, so I'm not sure I could do much better.

Leigh 4:27

Right, okay. Well I felt like I butchered it, so apologies to Dr. Sandra Thom Jones if I did butcher that. Um we talked about this before we started recording. It was a really clever story and a very worthy winner. Uh, it was unique. Obviously, I'm I'm not going to give anything away, but suffice to say, it was very clever, kept me guessing all the way to the end, and when you read it, you'll see why, and has a fantastic twist at the end. Um so she fit a massive amount into the story, definitely hanging on every word to get to the end. Um, I'm not a huge short story reader and never probably never really have been. Um, but when I do read them and when I do read good ones, I'm I find myself asking myself, why do I not read more of them? Um and yeah, and so these have been fantastic. So thoroughly deserved winner. And second prize was won by so second prize sponsored by Simon and Schuster. Uh was run by um Nette Hilton from Toowoomba in Queensland for her story without a word. Um and this too, and we talked about again, I'm not gonna I'm not gonna talk about any of the things or the themes across these first two winners, um, but they do have a a similar theme. Uh, and this one was also uh equally unique and uh interesting and yeah, a a really different story and uh you know again a thoroughly deserving winner. Um and then third prize, which is the Sun Bookshop and Fremantle Press Award, was Jacqui Horwood, uh also a Victorian from Clunes for for her story Rebel Girl. Um and uh this was great as well. Um this one's got a music theme to it, um, which I really enjoy as somebody who is a massive music fan, really enjoyed this. Um was a fantastic uh but yeah, it was a and it was a fantastic story. So congratulations to the first the the three main prize winners, but there were a collection of other prizes as well. So I think there's a um there's a dozen or fourteen different categories and some fantastic stories, obviously. And you can read all about those, you can read all of those stories uh in the 17th cut of the Scarlet Stiletto uh awards book. And obviously, outside of the the top three, there are a collection of other awards on the night. So um what do we have? So there was the Echo Publishing for the best young writer under 19 years of age, and there was the Melbourne Athenaeum Library Body in the Library Award, which I think is an incredibly unique title. Uh HQ Books Award for the Best Thriller, the Carrie Greenwood Award for Best Malice Detective Story, the Every Cloud Prynn Award for Best Mystery and History Story, Bolton Clark Art and Crime Award, Clandestine Press Award for the Best Cross Genre Story, Clandestine Press uh the business behind the publishing of the ebook. Um so great to see them getting involved as well. There's the Cate Kennedy Award for Best Short Story inspired by a forensic clue, Script Works Award for a great film idea, and then the Writer's Victoria Award for the story with the most satisfying retribution. Um you can read all about this on our show notes, and I'll link across to the Sisters in Crime website where you can for $5 buy your copy of the 17th cut of the Scarlet Stiletto's book. Um and did you have a favourite? What were your highlights from that?

Helen 8:18

Oh, good question. But you know, the first thing I think we have to address the elephant in the room, Leigh. Unlike you, I'm a huge fan of short stories. So I think that, you know, I think they're a highly undervalued genre. So I just raced through these things, and now I need to go back and read the other 16 cuts so I'm ready to get into it. But um I also really enjoyed The Winning Story by Sandra Tom Jones. Um, look, I was really fascinated to learn that she was diagnosed with autism at the age of 50 after both of her sons had received their own diagnoses. Um, and look, when you when you look her up, she's become an incredible advocate for autism inclusion, and she's written actually a whole bunch of non-fiction books on the topic, including growing into autism, working with autism. And what I love is that she also writes fiction featuring autistic characters, and she brings that lived experience really to her storytelling, so it's so so unique. And I believe that she's working on her first full novel at the moment, so I'm definitely going to keep an eye out for that when it comes out.

Leigh 9:20

That's fantastic to hear because it was such a good story, and um she obviously is writes very clever characters, so it would be great to see that in a longer form, uh, longer form fiction. And I'm not just saying that as somebody who reads not many short stories, but um that would be great. That's fantastic news.

Helen 9:41

I also wanted to give a shout out for the winner of the Young Rush Award for females under the age of 19. Now, the lass who won, Amber Woodburne,'s only 12 years old, but a fantastic, aspiring author. She lives in North West Victoria with her mum and her dad and her dogs, as it said in the precise. And her story, A Midnight Murder, was a cracker. This girl has a career ahead of her, so we should keep an eye out because who else could write a story that featured a young girl called Ruby who's trying to solve a really tricky crime, only assisted by her mouth nibbles. But she also has a surprise appearance from a very prominent historical figure. So hopefully that's wet your appetite to keep reading through the whole lot.

Leigh 10:24

I love hearing about young people entering awards like this, and I love hearing about young people writing, so that is fantastic. Um, and I think any young person that is taking the time to put stories together and submit them, which in itself can be a quite a daunting prospect. I think that is fantastic. So congratulations to her as well.

Helen 10:44

Yeah, hear hear.

Leigh 10:47

So you can find all this information in our show notes, links to the Sisters in Crime website, and how you can get your copy of the 17th cut of the Scarlet Stiletto Awards ebook.

Helen 10:58

Thanks, Leigh. That was a fantastic wrap-up. Uh I wanted to give a quick um shout out for what's coming up in the next episode. We'll be talking about the Ned Kelly Awards. Now, this is the flagship event for Australian crime writing. We'll run through the standout winners from 2025 and then really try and unpick why the crime writing scene here is absolutely buzzing at the moment. So if you're trying to find out what to read next in Aussie Crime, I recommend that the Ned Kelly winners are really one of the best places to start. We've also reached out to Dr. Kelly Gardner, who not only is the current president of the Sisters in Crime Association, but is actually an award-winning author, educator, and all-round literary powerhouse Leigh. So she writes everything from historical fiction to young adult books, and she spent years teaching creative writing at Uni's and mentoring emerging writers. And now, interestingly, her latest book, which was co-written with Sharmini Kumar, is called Miss Carolyn Bingley, Private Investigator, which caught my interest as a bit of a Jane Austen fan. And it's actually set two years after the events of Pride and Prejudice, and it features, of course, Miss Carolyn Bingley, sort of Lizzie's wiser, more glamorous older sister, who tries her hand at being a private investigator. So sounds like a lot's fun, and I'm gonna have put to add I'm going to have to add that one to my reading list. Um and lucky for us, she's confirmed that she'd love to join us for a future episode. So that's going to be a great conversation when it drops.

Leigh 12:29

So, yes, I was very happy when she accepted our invitation to come on the show. So I'm really looking forward to speaking to her. And just if this comes out in the audio, my kids jumping around in the bedroom upstairs. It's not a dead body on the floor that I'm keeping hidden, it's children jumping around at bedtime. So we'll see whether that goes in or not.

Helen 12:54

Um whatever you say, Leigh, we'll believe you. You should have your moment in court. So that's it for this episode. We're putting the bookmark back in the book till next time.

Leigh 13:06

See you next week.