Press
Press Release
01/05/2009
Costa Book Awards 2008 Category Winners Announced
* Sebastian Barry triumphs in the Costa Novel Award category for The Secret Scripture
* The Outcast, the acclaimed debut by Sadie Jones, takes the Costa First Novel Award
* Nonagenarian and oldest-ever category-winning author Diana Athill collects the Costa Biography Award for Somewhere Towards the End
London, 19.30pm 5th January 2009: Costa, the UK's largest and fastest-growing coffee shop chain, today announces the Costa Book Awards 2008 winners in the Novel, First Novel, Biography, Poetry and Children's Book categories.
The Costa Book Awards recognise some of the most outstanding and enjoyable books of the last year by writers based in the UK and Ireland.
Originally established in 1971 by Whitbread PLC, Costa announced its takeover of the sponsorship of the UK's popular and prestigious book prize in 2006.
The five successful authors who will now compete for the 2008 Costa Book of the Year are:
* Sadie Jones, whose bestselling debut novel, The Outcast, scoops the First Novel Award
* Sebastian Barry, who triumphs in the Novel Award category for The Secret Scripture after missing out on the Man Booker
* Diana Athill, who wins the Costa Biography Award for her memoir, Somewhere Towards the End. At the age of 91, Diana is the oldest-ever category-winning author in the history of the Book Awards
* Adam Foulds with his debut work of poetry about the Mau Mau uprisings in Kenya, The Broken Word
* Michelle Magorian, the popular author of Goodnight Mr Tom, who wins the Children's Book Award for Just Henry, her first new book in ten years
"The Costa Book Awards have an excellent track record of recognising and celebrating some of the very best current British writing, and books that can be enjoyed by everyone," said John Derkach, Managing Director, Costa. "We're very proud to be announcing such an outstanding collection of books which we know people will enjoy reading. Our final judges will have a tough time selecting just one from these five for the title of Costa Book of the Year - but it makes for a very exciting awards ceremony later this month."
The five Costa Book Award winners, each of whom will receive ?5,000, were selected from 616 entries, the highest ever. The five books are now eligible for the ultimate prize - the 2008 Costa Book of the Year.
The winner will be selected by a panel of judges chaired by columnist and broadcaster Matthew Parris and including Rosamund Pike, Michael Buerk, Alexander Armstrong and Andrea Catherwood. It will be announced at an awards ceremony hosted by Mariella Frostrup at the Intercontinental Hotel in central London on Tuesday 27th January 2009.
Since the introduction of the Book of the Year award in 1985, it has been won eight times by a novel, four times by a first novel, five times by a biography, five times by a collection of poetry and once by a children's book. The 2007 Costa Book of the Year was won by A.L. Kennedy for Day.
For additional information go to http://www.costabookawards.com
Full details of the Category Award Winners follow.
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2008 Costa Book Award Winners
Costa Novel Award:
The Secret Scripture; Sebastian Barry
Costa First Novel Award:
The Outcast; Sadie Jones
Costa Biography Award:
Somewhere Towards the End; Diana Athill
Costa Poetry Award:
The Broken Word; Adam Foulds
Costa Children's Book Award:
Just Henry Michelle Magorian
Previous Books of the Year
2007 Day A.L. Kennedy Novel
2006 The Tenderness of Wolves Stef Penney First Novel
2005 Matisse: the Master Hilary Spurling Biography
2004 Small Island Andrea Levy Novel
2003 The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time Mark Haddon Novel
2002 Samuel Pepys: The Unequalled Self Claire Tomalin Biography
2001 The Amber Spyglass Philip Pullman Children's Book
2000 English Passengers Matthew Kneale Novel
1999 Beowulf Seamus Heaney Poetry
1998 Birthday Letters Ted Hughes Poetry
1997 Tales from Ovid Ted Hughes Poetry
1996 The Spirit Level Seamus Heaney Poetry
1995 Behind the Scenes at the Museum Kate Atkinson First Novel
1994 Felicia's Journey William Trevor Novel
1993 Theory of War Joan Brady Novel
1992 Swing Hammer Swing! Jeff Torrington First Novel
1991 A Life of Picasso John Richardson Biography
1990 Hopeful Monsters Nicholas Mosley Novel
1989 Coleridge: Early Visions Richard Holmes Biography
1988 The Comforts of Madness Paul Sayer First Novel
1987 Under the Eye of the Clock Christopher Nolan Biography
1986 An Artist of the Floating World Kazuo Ishiguro Novel
1985 Elegies Douglas Dunn Poetry
2008 Costa Novel Award
The Secret Scripture by Sebastian Barry
Faber and Faber
About the book:
Roseanne McNulty, perhaps nearing her 100th birthday ? no one is quite sure ? faces an uncertain future, as the Roscommon Regional Mental Hospital where she's spent the best part of her adult life prepares for closure. Over the weeks leading up to this upheaval, she talks often with her psychiatrist Dr Grene. Told through their respective journals, the story that emerges is at once shocking and deeply beautiful. Refracted through the haze of memory and retelling, Roseanne's story becomes an alternative, secret, history of Ireland.
About the author:
Sebastian Barry is a playwright and novelist who was born in Dublin in 1955. His novels include The Whereabouts of Eneas McNulty (1998), Annie Dunne (2002) and A Long Long Way (2005), which was shortlisted for the Man Booker Prize and the Dublin International Impac Prize. He has won many awards including the Christopher Ewart-Biggs Prize, the London Critics Circle Award and the Kerry Group Irish Fiction Prize. His plays include The Steward of Christendom (1995), Our Lady of Sligo (1998) and The Pride of Parnell Street (2007). Barry lives in Wicklow with his wife and three children.
What the judges said:
"This exquisitely written love story takes you on an unforgettable journey ? you won't read a better book this year."
Judges
Dan Fenton - Director, John Sandoe (Bookshop) Limited
Pauline McLynn - Actress and Writer
Matthew Sweet - Writer and Broadcaster
Shortlist, selected from a total of 144 entries:
Chris Cleave - The Other Hand. Sceptre
Louis de Bernieres - A Partisan's Daughter. Harvill Secker
Patrick McGrath - Trauma. Bloomsbury
Previous Novel Award winners include:
A.L. Kennedy Day 2007
William Boyd Restless 2006
Ali Smith The Accidental 2005
Andrea Levy Small Island 2004
Mark Haddon The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time 2003
Michael Frayn Spies 2002
2008 Costa First Novel Award
The Outcast by Sadie Jones
Chatto & Windus
About the book:
1957 and Lewis Aldridge is travelling back to his home in the South of England. He is straight out of jail and nineteen years old. His return will trigger the implosion not just of his family, but of a whole community. A decade earlier, his father's homecoming takes a different shape. The war is over and Gilbert has recently been demobbed. He reverts easily to suburban life, but his wife and young son resist the stuffy routine. Lewis and his mother escape to the woods for picnics, just as they did in the wartime days. Nobody is surprised that Gilbert's wife counters convention, but they are all shocked when, after one of their jaunts, Lewis comes back without her.
About the author:
Sadie Jones was born in London and grew up in a creative environment: her father is the Jamaican poet Evan Jones, and her mother was an actress. She worked in a variety of jobs including video production, temping and as a waitress. After travelling in America, the Caribbean and Mexico, Sadie moved to Paris where she taught English and wrote her first screenplay. She settled in London and spent several years as a screenwriter before writing her debut novel. The Outcast has gone on to be shortlisted for the 2008 Orange Prize, selected as a Richard & Judy Summer Read, has been serialised on Radio 4's Book at Bedtime and won the Good Housekeeping Best Debut Award. Sadie is married to the architect Tim Boyd, has two children and is currently working on her second novel.
What the judges said:
"This books portrayal of pain makes it a riveting and heartbreaking read ? it's rare for a first novel to be this assured."
Judges:
Sarah Broadhurst - Book Reviewer
Lisa Jewell - Author
Chris Rushby - Buying Director, Bertrams/THE
Shortlist, selected from a total of 112 entries:
Poppy Adams - The Behaviour of Moths. Virago
Jennie Rooney - Inside the Whale. Chatto & Windus
Tom Rob Smith - Child 44. Simon & Schuster
Previous First Novel Award winners include:
Catherine O'Flynn What Was Lost 2007
Stef Penney The Tenderness of Wolves 2006
Tash Aw The Harmony Silk Factory 2005
Susan Fletcher Eve Green 2004
DBC Pierre Vernon God Little 2003
Norman Lebrecht The Song of Names 2002
2008 Costa Biography Award
Somewhere Towards the End by Diana Athill
Granta
About the book:
Looking back on a life well lived and the stories, events and relationships that have peppered it, Athill offers original and lively reflections on the lessons she has learned ? lessons that will strike a universal chord with readers in any stage of life. Never less than vivid and frank, she writes with intimate honesty about friendship, love, sex, and sore feet. Somewhere Towards the End addresses what it means to be old and to face death every day, but still have the strength to strive for life with an unquenchable curiosity for all that it brings.
About the author:
Diana Athill was born in 1917. She worked for the BBC throughout the Second World War and helped establish the publishing company Andr? Deutsch. She has written five volumes of memoir including the highly-acclaimed Stet, and one novel, all published by Granta Books. She lives in London.
What the judges said:
"A perfect memoir of old age ? candid, detailed, charming, totally lacking in self-pity or sentimentality and above all, beautifully, beautifully written."
Judges:
Michael Buerk - Journalist, Writer and Broadcaster
Peter Saxton - Biography Buyer, Waterstones
Marilyn Warnick - Books Editor, Mail on Sunday
Shortlist, selected from a total of 135 entries:
Judith Mackrell - Bloomsbury Ballerina. Weidenfeld & Nicolson
Sathnam Sanghera - If You Don't Know Me By Now. Viking
Jackie Wullschlager - Chagall. Allen Lane
Previous Biography Award winners include:
Simon Sebag Montefiore Young Stalin 2007
Brian Thompson Keeping Mum 2006
Hilary Spurling Matisse: the Master 2005
John Guy My Heart is My Own: The Life of Mary Queen of Scots 2004
DJ Taylor Orwell: The Life 2003
Claire Tomalin Samuel Pepys: The Unequalled Self 2002
2008 Costa Poetry Award
The Broken Word by Adam Foulds
Jonathan Cape
About the book:
The Broken Word is a delicate and powerful poetic sequence that charts a young man's progress through a dark period in British colonial history - the Mau Mau uprisings in Kenya. With language and imagery that feels utterly contemporary, and subject matter ? tribal violence and subsequent retribution ? that seems almost Homeric, Foulds gives the narrative all the febrile energy of classical drama, re-charged and re-imagined.
About the author:
Adam Foulds was born in 1974 and lives in South London. He is a graduate of the Creative Writing MA at the University of East Anglia and his poetry has appeared in a number of literary magazines. Adam wrote his first novel, The Truth About These Strange Times, whilst working as a forklift truck driver in a warehouse. The book was published in 2007 and won a Betty Trask Award. Adam subsequently went on to win The Sunday Times Young Writer of The Year Award in April 2008. The Broken Word is Adams first work of poetry.
What the judges said:
"It is a rare achievement to write a poetry book that the reader simply can't put down. Readers of poetry and fiction alike will be swept along by its chilling narrative."
Judges:
Rachel Campbell-Johnston - Art Critic, The Times
Roger McGough CBE - Poet and Broadcaster
Robyn Marsack - Director, Scottish Poetry Library
Shortlist, selected from a total of 100 entries:
Ciaran Carson - For All We Know. Gallery Books
Kathryn Simmonds - Sunday at the Skin Launderette. Seren
Greta Stoddart - Salvation Jane. Anvil Press
Previous Poetry Award winners include:
Jean Sprackland Tilt 2007
John Haynes Letter to Patience 2006
Christopher Logue Cold Calls 2005
Michael Symmons Roberts Corpus 2004
Don Paterson Landing Light 2003
Paul Farley The Ice Age 2002
2008 Costa Children's Book Award
Just Henry by Michelle Magorian
Egmont Press
About the book:
Set in post-war Britain, Just Henry is the story of a young boy who escapes the bleakness of life through his passion for cinema. His stepfather, whom he despises, will never compare with his dead father, a war hero. Appalled to find that his partners on a school photography trip include Jeffries, whose father went AWOL and Pip, who is illegitimate, he's about to learn that tolerance and friendship are more important than social stigmas. Processing a film that he took on the trip, Henry makes an alarming discovery. Like a bomb waiting to explode, his world is about to unravel.
About the author:
Michelle Magorian was born in Southsea, Portsmouth, of a Welsh mother and Irish father with an Armenian surname, and began writing regularly while studying at the Rose Bruford College of Speech and Drama in Kent. Having studied mime with the famous Marcel Marceau, she went on to work in theatre, television and film, and toured her one-woman mime show in Italy and England. Just Henry is her first new book in ten years. Her first novel, Goodnight Mister Tom, won numerous awards and has sold in excess of 1.2 million copies in the UK alone.
What the judges said:
"This is a master storyteller at work with the sort of descriptive writing that is a joy to read. Just Henry is a soaring, uplifting warm bath of a book ? a wonderful roller-coaster of a story which we all absolutely loved."
Judges:
Victoria Hislop - Writer
John Newman - Children's Buyer, Newham Bookshop
Sue Polchow - Northampton Schools Library Service Advisor
Gwen Baines (aged 13) - Costa Book Awards competition winner
Kambole Campbell (aged 13) - Costa Book Awards competition winner
Sylvie Pope (aged 10) - Costa Book Awards competition winner
Shortlist, selected from a total of 125 entries:
Keith Gray - Ostrich Boys. Definitions
Saci Lloyd - The Carbon Diaries 2015. Hodder Children's Books
Jenny Valentine - Broken Soup. HarperCollins Children's Books
Previous Children's Book Award winners include:
Ann Kelley The Bower Bird 2007
Linda Newbery Set in Stone 2006
Kate Thompson The New Policeman 2005
Geraldine McCaughrean Not the End of the World 2004
David Almond The Fire-Eaters 2003
Hilary McKay Saffy's Angel 2002
For further press information or to arrange an interview with any of the winning authors, please contact:
Amanda Johnson
Costa Book Awards Press and Publicity
Telephone: 020 7751 2069 (direct line) or 07715 922180 (mobile)
Email: amanda@amandajohnsonpr.com
Notes for Editors:
The Costa Book Awards:
* The Costa Book Awards, formerly the Whitbread Book Awards, were established in 1971 to encourage, promote and celebrate the best contemporary British writing.
* The total prize fund for the Costa Book Awards stands at ?50,000.
* The award winners from the five categories - Novel, First Novel, Biography, Poetry and Children's Book - each receive ?5,000.
* The overall Costa Book of the Year is selected from the five category Award winners with the winner receiving a further ?25,000.
* The winner will be announced at an awards ceremony at the Intercontinental Hotel, central London on 27th January, 2009.
* To be eligible for the 2008 awards, books must have been first published in the UK or Ireland between 1 November 2007 and 31 October 2008.
* The 2007 winner of the Costa Book of the Year was A. L. Kennedy for Day (Cape).
About Costa:
* Costa is now officially the largest and fastest growing coffee shop chain in the UK. It opened its 1000th milestone store in March 2008 in Moscow.
* Costa was founded by Italian brothers Sergio and Bruno Costa in 1971. With 849 stores in the UK and over 300 internationally, Costa has enjoyed a remarkable period of growth since it opened its first store. It now operates in 25 countries.
* Costa Coffee was the first UK coffee shop chain to commit sourcing beans from Rainforest Alliance Certified farms.
* Costa's in-store baristas are all coached in the art of coffee-making at the company's unique Costa Coffee Academy based at its own roastery in Lambeth, London.
* Costa has been voted as one of the strongest UK brands by experts and consumers and has been awarded ?Superbrand' status.
* Costa set up a registered charity (no.327489) in 2006 called ?The Costa Foundation' to give something back to the communities within the countries from which Costa sources its coffee beans.
* Costa is part of the Whitbread family of brands.
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