After almost three decades of literary award famine, Bill Condon is feasting on the industry's juiciest prize.The Woonona author has won the $100,000 young adult fiction prize in the 2010 Prime Minister's Literary Awards for his rite-of-passage tale Confessions of a Liar, Thief and Failed Sex God."I almost had a heart attack, my wife screamed and Julia Gillard thought we were a comedy act," said Mr Condon of the award presentation in Melbourne on Monday."I can die happy now. I've been trying to win some kind of award for children's writing for 27 years."The awards - Australia's richest - change dramatically the fortunes of the journalist-turned-author, who said the nature of the publishing trade meant his "slice of life" books were destined for obscurity without a gong to generate interest.Confessions was written on a $4000 advance, then sold just $2800 worth of copies in 12 months."I only survive because I've been in the business for so long and have got a lot of royalties coming in from [past] books," Mr Condon said.The partly autobiographical book tells the story of a student at a Catholic boys' school in 1967 who witnesses a classmate falsely accused but refuses to tell the truth, following themes of first love and life choices.The opening draws from a disturbing incident from Mr Condon's own time at a Catholic boys' school in Bankstown, where a Brother assaulted a boy accused of stealing a wallet."The whole school witnessed it, in the quadrangle, the Brother punching, kicking and swearing at him," Mr Condon said."The boy fought back. I never saw him again."In the lead-up to writing Confessions, Mr Condon tracked down and telephoned the now adult boy, who had been expelled after the incident and "hadn't stopped thinking about it for 40 years".Mr Condon credited his wife, well-known children's author Di Bates and writing peers Maureen Johnson, Chris McTrustry, Vicki Stanton and Sandy Fussell, for their support.He was pleased with the award judges' nod to his "short, chiselled chapters" in which "not a word is wasted".His was one of two inaugural awards. The other, for children's fiction, went to Lorraine Marwood's Star Jumps.Eva Hornung won the prize for fiction (Dog Boy) and the non-fiction prize went to Grace Karskens (The Colony: A History of Early Sydney). Each winner receives $100,000.