Ian Rankin opens Edinburgh University library upgrade

Bestselling crime writer Ian Rankin has opened a redevelopment of Edinburgh University's main library:



Technorati Tag: Books

Tony Harrison wins inaugural PEN/Pinter prize

Poet and playwright Tony Harrison has won the inaugural PEN/Pinter prize for his "unmistakable and passionate voice". The prize is to be awarded annually to the writer who best exemplifies Pinter's own quest to "define the real truth of our lives and our societies". Harrison, who filed poems from the frontline in Bosnia for the Guardian in 1995, was selected by a panel of judges including Pinter's widow, the author Antonia Fraser, playwright Tom Stoppard and National Theatre director Nicholas Hytner. "When Tony's name came up it pretty much stopped the discussion," said Stoppard. "I think we all felt immediately that he was exactly the writer for the PEN/Pinter prize, and PEN/Pinter was exactly the prize for Tony. Harold would raise a glass to that." - Guardian

Technorati Tag: Books

2009 Booktrust Early Years Awards winners

The winners of the 2009 Booktrust Early Years Awards were announced at a ceremony at BAFTA, Piccadilly, London on 23 September.

Baby Book Award
Chick by Ed Vere (Puffin)

Pre-School Award
Oliver Who Travelled Far and Wide by Mara Bergman, illus. Nick Maland (Hodder Children's Books)

Best Emerging Illustrator
Box of Tricks by Katie Cleminson (Jonathan Cape)

Frank O'Connor Award winner is Simon Van Booy

"British author Simon Van Booy has won the world's richest short story prize, the Frank O'Connor award, for a collection which focuses on the different faces of love. Van Booy's Love Begins in Winter beat five other short story collections, including the US author Wells Tower's Everything Ravaged, Everything Burned and Zimbabwean Petina Gappah's An Elegy for Easterly, to win the €35,000 (£30,000) prize. Some big literary names, including Kazuo Ishiguro, Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie, Ali Smith and James Lasdun, had failed to make even the shortlist for this year's award."

New book: The UFO Files - from UK National Archives

"The UFO Files, published by The National Archives, is a collection of the most impressive reports from the Ministry of Defence's secret files on real-life UFO sightings. These reports are brought together for the first time, covering sightings from the early 1900s right up to the present day. The book includes sightings from civilians, as well as from military personnel and intelligence agencies. It looks at investigations conducted by British Intelligence and the CIA in response to UFO sightings, and their views on UFO threats to national security. Official reports, dramatic witness statements and personal interviews, many conducted by the author himself, are combined with rarely seen photographs and drawings."

Technorati Tag: Books

The Frances Lincoln Diverse Voices Children's Book Award

Frances Lincoln Limited and Seven Stories have announced the second Diverse Voices Award in memory of Frances Lincoln (1945 to 2001), to encourage and promote diversity in children's fiction. The purpose of The Frances Lincoln Diverse Voices Children's Book Award is to:

* Take positive steps to increase the representation of people writing from or about different cultural perspectives, whose work is published in Britain today.
* Promote new writing for children, especially by or about people whose culture and voice are currently under-represented.
* Recognise that as children's books shape our earliest perceptions of the world and its cultures, promoting writing that represents diversity will contribute to social and cultural tolerance.
* Support the process of writing rather than, as with the majority of prizes, promoting the publication.

Technorati Tag: Books

The Bookseller Retail Awards 2009 winners

The winners of the The Bookseller Retail Awards 2009 have been announced:

The Bookseller's Bookselling Company of the Year
W H Smith

Outstanding Contribution to Bookselling
Amanda Ross

High Street Retailer of the Year
Waterstone's

Direct to Consumer Bookselling Company of the Year
The Book Depository

Bertrams Independent Bookseller of the Year
Simply Books

Walker Books Children's Independent of the Year
Jarrolds Children's Book Department

Wiley Manager of the Year
Ian Critchley, Waterstone's Liverpool One

Usborne Children's Bookseller of the Year
Borders

Martina Cole General Retailer of the Year
W H Smith

Nielsen Marketing Campaign of the Year
Borders Where's Wally? On Google Earth

Technorati Tag: Books