Omar Musa wins 2026 Miles Franklin Literary Award for Heart of Darkness 'critique', Fierceland
Omar Musa's novel 'Fierceland' has been awarded the 2026 Miles Franklin Literary Award. The book is noted for its rhythmic prose and its exploration of the environmental and social impacts of palm oil plantations in Borneo.
Why it matters
The recognition highlights the intersection of post-colonial literature and environmental discourse in contemporary Australian writing.
Ghosts appear often throughout Fierceland. "Ghost stories are rife in Malaysian culture. My dad used to love telling me ghost stories when I was a kid," Musa says. ( ABC News: Jack Fisher )
Link copied Share Share article Omar Musa has won one of the nation's top literary prizes, the $60,000 Miles Franklin Literary Award, for his novel Fierceland, a family saga interrogating ideas of inheritance, complicity and colonialism.
The Malaysian Australian author described his win as "mind-blowing".
"You can never predict or expect something like this, but I'm really stoked to have my work recognised and acknowledged alongside such amazing peers," he tells ABC Arts.
"It also acknowledges the work of a lot of people behind the scenes. There's always this mythology about the solitary author up in their tower, scribbling away by themselves.
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