'The Australian Women Writers website began life as a reading and reviewing challenge in 2012. Its purpose was to promote reviewing of books by Australian women and was inspired, in part, by the statistical evidence supplied by the VIDA report, and later the Stella Count, that works by women were less likely than works by men to be reviewed in mainstream media and literary journals.
'The challenge was instigated by Elizabeth Lhuede, and from 2017 co-ordinated by Theresa Smith. Along the way many bloggers, authors and academics contributed to the project ... This phase of the challenge included works in all genres by Australian women, regardless of date of publication. Over the course of ten years, the AWW blog helped to bring attention to many contemporary and past writers.
'From 2022 on ... the website will no longer host a challenge for works by contemporary authors. Instead it will focus on 19th- and early to mid-20th-century writers, including authors who may not have achieved prominence in their lifetimes, or whose works have been forgotten and/or overlooked because of past gender bias.'
Source: 'History', Australian Women Writers Challenge website.
