The Story of the Month is chosen from the Story of the Week winners announced from the past month.
The finalists for December were:
Unfinished by Carol Anne Harvey
Balloonman by Melody Leming-Wilson
Assemblage by Charlie Swailes
Holiday by Chad Bunch
Unopened by Alyce Clark
The winner of the December 2019 Story of the Month, and the $10 prize, is…
Balloonman
There is great art in the ability to tell a story implicitly, as Melody does in this portrait of summer passing into autumn. The character of the balloonman is painted in vivid colour, from his relationship with the children to his awareness of the passage of time. The more I try to describe my interpretations of this story, the more it feels like I’m doing Melody a disservice: the story and its characters speak for themselves so beautifully without me getting in the way!