Rebecca Giggs

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Rebecca Giggs is a Perth-based Australian nonfiction writer, known for Fathoms: The World in the Whale.

Contents

Career

Giggs studied at the University of Western Australia. She holds an LLB, BA Arts (Hons) and a PhD in ecological literary studies conferred in 2014. [1]

Giggs is an honorary fellow at the Macquarie University in Sydney. [2] She was awarded the 2017 Mick Dark flagship fellowship by Varuna for "The Whale in the Room", the working title for Fathoms. [3] She won support from Writers Victoria through the Neilma Sidney Literary Travel Fund to visit the Rachel Carson Centre for Environment and Society in Munich, Germany as a writing fellow in 2018. [4]

As an essayist, Giggs has contributed to The Atlantic on science subjects from "Why We're Afraid of Bats" to "Human Drugs Are Polluting the Water—And Animals Are Swimming in It". [5]

Her first book, Fathoms: The World in the Whale, was published in 2020 worldwide by Scribe [6] and by Simon & Schuster in the USA. [7]

Awards and recognition

Kirkus Reviews named Fathoms in their "10 Top Summer Reads in Nonfiction" [8] and described the book as "a thoughtful, ambitiously crafted appeal for the preservation of marine mammals". [9] In November 2020 Giggs won the Nib Literary Award [10] and in February 2021 she won the Andrew Carnegie Medal for Nonfiction for Fathoms. [11] Her book was also shortlisted for the 2020 Kirkus Prize for Nonfiction [12] and the PEN/E. O. Wilson Literary Science Writing Award. [13] Fathoms won the Premier's Prize for an Emerging Writer at the 2020 Western Australian Premier's Book Awards [14] and was shortlisted for the 2021 Stella Prize. [15] In 2021 Fathoms was shortlisted for the Wainwright Prize, alongside David Attenborough's A Life on Our Planet and others, in the Global Conservation Writing category. [16] She was shortlisted for the 2021 Bragg UNSW Press Prize for Science Writing for "Soundings", an extract from Fathoms. [17] [18]

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References

  1. ↑ "Award Verification Service: Rebecca April Giggs". The University of Western Australia. Retrieved 26 August 2021.
  2. ↑ "Rebecca Giggs". Macquarie University. Retrieved 11 February 2021.
  3. ↑ "Varuna announces recipients of 2017 Residency Fellowships". Books+Publishing. 4 October 2016. Retrieved 11 February 2021.
  4. ↑ "Writers Victoria announces Neilma Sidney Literary Travel Fund round-two recipients". Books+Publishing. 11 April 2018. Retrieved 11 February 2021.
  5. ↑ Giggs, Rebecca. "Rebecca Giggs". The Atlantic. Retrieved 11 February 2021.
  6. ↑ Giggs, Rebecca (2020). Fathoms: The world in the whale. Brunswick, Victoria: Scribe Publications. ISBN   978-1-925321-38-8. OCLC   1153440206.
  7. ↑ Giggs, Rebecca (2020). Fathoms: The world in the whale (First ed.). New York: Simon & Schuster. ISBN   978-1-9821-2069-6. OCLC   1124313331.
  8. ↑ Liebetrau, Eric (6 July 2020). "10 Top Summer Reads in Nonfiction". Kirkus Reviews. Retrieved 11 February 2021.
  9. ↑ "Fathoms: The World in the Whale". Kirkus Reviews. 15 May 2020. Retrieved 12 February 2021.
  10. ↑ "'Fathoms' wins Nib Literary Award". Books+Publishing. 12 November 2020. Retrieved 11 February 2021.
  11. ↑ "Giggs wins ALA Andrew Carnegie Medal". Books+Publishing. 9 February 2020. Retrieved 11 February 2021.
  12. ↑ "The 2020 Kirkus Prize". www.bookreporter.com. Retrieved 11 February 2021.
  13. ↑ "Announcing the 2021 PEN America Literary Awards Finalists". PEN America. 10 February 2021. Retrieved 11 February 2021.
  14. ↑ "WA Premier's Book Awards announced". Books+Publishing. 26 August 2021. Retrieved 26 August 2021.
  15. ↑ "Stella Prize 2021 shortlist announced". Books+Publishing. 25 March 2021. Retrieved 25 March 2021.
  16. ↑ "Sethi, Winn and Rebanks shortlisted for Wainwright Prize". The Bookseller. 21 August 2021. Retrieved 5 August 2021.
  17. ↑ "Rebecca Giggs shortlisted for Bragg Prize for Science Writing | Rebecca-giggs-shortlisted-for-bragg-prize-for-science-writing | Scribe Publications". scribepublications.com.au. 13 October 2021. Retrieved 15 October 2021.
  18. ↑ "Bragg Prize for Science Writing shortlist announced". Books+Publishing. 12 October 2021. Retrieved 15 October 2021.
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