On Saturday 18 July, Old Government House in Parramatta Park was the setting for a remarkable celebration – 630 creative voices mainly from Western Sydney, competing for a place in one of the region’s most celebrated writing prizes.

The Living Stories Western Sydney Writing Prize, a WestWords and WestLit Libraries initiative supported by the NSW Government through Create NSW, drew entries from 14 local government areas and a region home to over 2.5 million Australians from 180 countries, speaking nearly 100 languages. 

Thirty judges selected winners and highly commended entrants from each area, with an overall winner drawn from among them.

Winners were published in the 2026 anthology “Is It True….?” and shared in a cash prize pool of up to $10,000. 

The showcase was officially launched by State Member for Parramatta, Donna Davis, on day one (Friday 17, July).

Among those celebrated was Kinara Sulthoni, LGA winner for Canterbury-Bankstown in the 10-12 age category, whose story “The Beasts of Cook’s River” stopped the room. 

Written in the first person, narrator Nora and her friends encounter mysterious creatures along the banks of the real-life Cook’s River – a notoriously polluted waterway in Sydney’s south-west – only to learn through the river’s guardian that these gentle beasts were taken away by the British at the time of Captain Cook.

It’s a story about loss, place and history, told with a confidence well beyond Kinara’s tender years.

The story of how Kinara got to be competing in such an ‘arena’ is just as compelling. 

Kinara Sulthoni with Donna Davis, State Member for Parramatta.

Date Palm Tree, the Western Sydney digital publishing house dedicated to young Muslim writers and frequently referenced in AMUST over the past 12 months, recognised her talent when she was just eight years of age, publishing her first story as an e-Book. 

Since then she has written multiple stories, culminating in this prize-winning entry. 

“It’s the pathway we have hoped for, for the next generation of young Muslim kids,” says award-winning writer Annie McCann, founder of the Right Pen Collective and author of the bestselling “My Harimau King”.

For Annie, this achievement is deeply personal. 

Both of Indonesian background, she regards Kinara as a niece and Kinara’s father Alam as a big brother. 

Australia’s literary future is in safe hands!

When Kinara placed a big sign on her writing desk –“Thank you, Bibi Annie, for inspiring me to write stories” – it moved Annie to tears. 

A long-time champion of Muslim voices in Australian literature (and a humble one at that), Annie has noted that her own novel reaching number one “wasn’t about Annie McCann – it was about a hijabi protagonist proving the tide is turning.” 

In Kinara, that tide now has a name.

The 2026 Living Stories anthology “Is It True….?” is available through WestWords.