Patricia Holland

Photograph by Glenn Adamus

Patricia Holland was born in Liverpool, England, but has lived in Australia since the age of five, in Melbourne and on farms and cattle stations in Central and North Queensland. She now lives in South Fremantle, Western Australia. Patricia’s publications include: journalism articles in magazines and newspapers, including Queensland Country Life, Outback Magazine, National Farmer, Townsville Bulletin, The Morning Bulletin (Rockhampton), and The Northern Miner (Charters Towers); short stories in Idiom magazine; and a children’s book, Patch the Australian Cattle Dog (1999), which won a regional education award.

Patricia’s first novel, The Styx (Lacuna), is dedicated to the memory of her eldest daughter, Sophie, who suffered from Rett Syndrome and died when she was seven years old. Earlier drafts of the manuscript were selected for Hachette’s Manuscript Development Program in 2015 and Legend Press’s Luke Bitmead Bursary in which it placed third in 2016.

She has finished her second manuscript: a story of two sisters who want their suffering to count for something—finding justice for those betrayed by the traditional rules of engagement. It has been longlisted in The Grindstone Literary Prize 2022.

Her writing has just been longlisted in The Cheshire Prize 2023.

Now finishing a manuscript exploring the hidden domestic world of gaslighting set underneath the Nullarbor Highway in WA.

The Styx—available now. Ask at your favourite bookshop (or a bookshop that is handy).

• Australia-wide and international—direct from publisher: Lacuna Publishing