Dunsborough author Tim Hawken has won the Australian Horror Writer's Association's Flash Fiction Story of the year for the second time.
Judges described his story Mother Always Gets What She Wants as: 'standing out in terms of style, structure, clarity and overall delivery, as well as being a snapshot of despair.'
Mr Hawken's first won the award in 2013 just after he had published his second book.
"Somehow I won that, it was the first short story I had ever written," he said.
"I thought that was really cool and I have tried ever since and was never shortlisted or anything, I thought it must have been a fluke.
"Then this year it came through as a win again."
Mr Hawken's has been part of the Australian Horror Writer's Association since he won his first award and said they were an amazing group of people.
"They are full writing geeks and it is really great to be a part of," he said.
"It is not just open to members, anyone around the world can enter so you are competing in an open field.
"It is blind judged so they do not know who the person is or where they are from, all the judges get is a story in front of them and judge it on the merits of the story itself."
Mr Hawken writes dark fiction novels and said his short horror stories were darker than what he would normally write.
He uses his Instagram account @tim_hawken to write 100 word micro stories inspired by art he has found on the internet.
His Instagram stories are exactly 100 words which helps him practice the art of writing almost on a daily basis.
"The story that won the flash fiction prize was only 500 words, which was half the 1,000 word limit," he said.
"It was all about trying to figure out how to say something semi-meaningful in a short period of space."
Similar to his Instagram account, Mother Always Gets What She Wants was inspired by a piece of art he had seen of a strange looking alien clutching a baby.
Mr Hawken thought was the alien protecting the baby or was it trying to steal the baby.
"It is essentially about a matron from an orphanage where there was an accident and she lost her job," he said.
"You do not get the full context but there was a fire and she starts stealing children from hospitals because she loved being a matron and wants to continue raising them.
"It is that contrast of nurturing and taking children away from the nurturing environment that they are in. It is that ironic twist."
Mr Hawken is currently working on his fifth novel which he expects to release in 2021.
