The Pearl Prize 2025 is presented by Osborne and Fawkner Publishing and supported by Midsumma Festival and City of Port Phillip. The Pearl Prize 2025 is stretching into the parameters of AI (Artificial Intelligence) and ML (Machine Learning) by presenting stories about contemporary, past or futuristic possibilities of humans finding connection between the machine mechanisms of the created and us and the nuances in relationships within the Queer realm. Finalists were selected from across Australia. Their words within these pages, touch on lived experience, a little fantasy, and a lot of self-expression, from writers within the LGBTQIA+ community. So, open the pages and celebrate Queer writing in all glorious forms.