Colin Barrett and Liz Hyder are among those named as winners of the Nero Awards Books of the Year for 2024.
Four books have been chosen as the best Fiction, Non-Fiction, Debut Fiction and Children’s Fiction books of the year from the UK and Ireland, all vying for the overall £30,000 prize to be announced later this year.
The Fiction winner was named as Lost in the Garden by Adam S Leslie (Dead Ink Books), while the Debut Fiction winner was Barrett for Wild Houses (Jonathan Cape). The children’s Fiction category went to The Twelve by Liz Hyder, which is illustrated by Tom de Freston (Pushkin Children’s Books), while Sophie Elmhirst secured the Non-Fiction prize for Maurice and Maralyn: An Extraordinary True Story of Shipwreck, Survival and Love (Chatto & Windus)
Each category winner receives £5,000 and is now in the running for the Nero Gold Prize, Book of the Year 2024, which will be announced at a ceremony in London on 5th March 2025. A final judging panel, chaired by writer Bill Bryson, will select the overall winner, who will receive an additional £30,000 prize.
Organisers said: “Together, the books represent high-quality writing and craftsmanship in literature and offer something for readers of all tastes: a true tale of love amid a shipwreck; a folk horror story following three friends on a perilous journey to a forbidden place; a comic novel set in small town Ireland; and a children’s adventure filled with magic, folklore and science. These four exceptional books have been selected out of hundreds of books reviewed.”
