Blockbusters, newcomers, pageturners, and a national icon: Shortlists for 2021 British Book Awards reflect year of “turmoil, debate and hope”
• UK publishing delivers vast array of successes, despite unprecedented challenges for publishers, booksellers, and authors
• Shortlists revealed today, winners announced in a virtual event on Thursday, 13th May 2021
More than 50 different books have been shortlisted for the hotly contested Book of the Year accolades at the 2021 British Book Awards. As well as celebrating some of the most anticipated books of the year by Barack Obama, Hilary Mantel, David Walliams, Marian Keyes and Richard Osman, and first-time writers including Booker Prize winner Douglas Stuart and NHS hero Captain Sir Tom Moore, this year’s awards also recognise authors who have crashed into the UK market and taken it by storm, including Brit Bennett and Delia Owens.
For Fiction Book of the Year, the much-anticipated finale to Hilary Mantel’s Wolf Hall Trilogy The Mirror and The Light (4th Estate) will go up against Waterstones Book of the Year Hamnet by Maggie O’Farrell (Tinder Press), and The Vanishing Half by Brit Bennett (Dialogue Books), which 2020 Author of the Year Bernardine Evaristo, called “utterly mesmerising”.
The Debut Book of the Year Award shortlist bursts with talent as first-time writers Paul Mendez, (Rainbow Milk, Dialogue) and Naoise Dolan, (Exciting Times, W&N) join Booker Prize winner Douglas Stuart for his novel Shuggie Bain (Picador), and Dolly Alderton with the bestselling Ghosts (Fig Tree).
National hero Sir Captain Tom Moore and his touching biography Tomorrow will be a Good Day (Michael Joseph) sits alongside Barack Obama’s presidential memoir A Promised Land (Viking), and Layla Saad’s essential book Me and My White Supremacy (Quercus), for the Non-fiction: Narrative Book of the Year trophy.
A second nomination for the A Promised Land (Penguin Random House Audio) comes in the Audiobook of the Year shortlist and goes up against self-narrated runaway bestseller Grown Ups by Marian Keyes (WF Howes), and The Sandman by Neil Gaiman and Dirk Maggs (Audible), which features a star- studded cast, including Riz Ahmed, James McAvoy and Michael Sheen.
For the Crime & Thriller Book of the Year crown 2019’s Author of the Year Lee Child, joined by his brother Andrew Child for The Sentinel (Bantam Press) will battle it out with the chart-busting The Thursday Murder Club (Viking) by Pointless presenter Richard Osman, and the second consecutive entry from Lucy Foley The Guest List (HarperFiction).
The shortlist for the newly created award Pageturner of the year, which seeks to recognise popular fiction titles across all formats, welcomes Where the Crawdads Sing author Delia Owens (Corsair), Ben Aaronvitch’s False Value (Gollancz) and Adele Park’s Just My Luck (HQ), in its inaugural year.
Writing duo Katie and Kevin Tsang and Dragon Mountain (Simon & Schuster), will go up against Children’s Fiction superstars David Walliams and Tony Ross’ Code Name Bananas (HarperCollins) and Tom Fletcher and Shane Devries’ The Danger Gang (Puffin).
Shortlisted for the Non-Fiction Narrative Book of the Year in 2020, Adam Kay is back for 2021, this time for the Children’s Illustrated Non-fiction Book of the Year with Kay’s Anatomy (Puffin), alongside David Olusoga’s Black and British (Macmillan), revised for younger readers and Katherine Rundell’s timely, The Book of Hope (Bloomsbury).
The nation’s favourite baker Nadiya Hussain (Nadiya Bakes, Michael Joseph), beauty and lifestyle expert Caroline Hirons (Skincare, HQ) and award-winning storyteller, podcaster and former monk, Jay Shetty (Think Like a Monk, HarperCollins), are all in the running for Non-Fiction Lifestyle Book of the Year.
Philip Jones, editor of The Bookseller and chair of the British Book Awards judges, said: “After a year in which we needed books more than ever, these shortlisted titles exemplify everything that was good and necessary from authors and publishers in 2020. From Shuggie Bain to The Thursday Murder Club, from All the Lonely People to The Danger Gang, from Hamnet to Black and British, these were the books that answered the call during this period of turmoil, debate and hope.”
Alice O’Keeffe, The Bookseller’s books editor and chair of the Books of the Year judges, said: “A lockdown year with unprecedented challenges for publishers and authors has given us some wonderful books, superbly published, which comprise our shortlists. From the six remarkable debuts to our readable pageturners, these are books to love, admire and celebrate.”
The nine Book of the Year winners will be decided by separate panels, with judges including comedians Lenny Henry and Mel Giedroyc, loved children’s TV presenter Konnie Huq, musician Frankie Bridge, MP David Lammy and CBBC ’s Rhys Stephenson.
Produced by the UK’s book industry magazine The Bookseller, the British Book Awards showcase the enormous range and depth of modern publishing – from publishers to booksellers, from agents to
authors and illustrators. The winners of this year’s Nibbies will be inaugurated at a virtual ceremony on 13th May, followed by a summer party to celebrate the shortlists, winners and the wider trade.
Last year’s inaugural virtual ceremony saw over 40,000 views, and for the first time ever welcomed the whole industry, with attendees joining the event everywhere from the South Coast to Scotland and beyond. The Bookseller also took home its own award for the ceremony itself, winning Event of the Year at the PPA Awards.
For further information, and to join the conversation please visit:
www.thebookseller.com/british-book-awards | www.twitter.com/thebookseller
