Talented local writers Paul Saxby of Bundaberg and David Hilcher of North Rockhampton won first and second regional prizes with their stories ‘Oysters’ and ‘Disappearing Lake’ in this year’s Bauhinia Literary Awards, announced at the CQ Multicultural Fair at Central Queensland University Rockhampton on Sunday August 17.

Marie Martin of Emerald was commended for her piece ‘Tampering with Pantheist’.

Two Bundaberg poets Muriel Courtenay and Elaine Courtman also took the main awards in the regional poetry section, while the judge highly commended Isabel Hock, Peggy Farrow, Marie Martin, Olga Morris, Siobhan O’Connor and Lorelle Schhneider, from Rockhampton, Gladstone, Emerald and Mt Perry.

More than 600 entries from all over Australia were received for this popular annual competition which has been organised by CQU Magazine Idiom 23 collective for more than a decade. The best stories and poems will be published in next year’s magazine.

The judges were impressed with the writing overall, and also with the numbers of state and high school students who entered. High school student prize winners included Hayley Brown (Victoria), Lily Erlinger (Queensland), and Will Ewing (Brisbane), while primary school student awards went to Tobias Lock (Fairfield, Qld) and Jamie Russell (Springsure, Qld), Ashleigh Howard (Bellbowrie) and Thomas Schuster (Parkhurst).