Historical Fiction Awards – Long List announced
Today marks the official announcement of the Longlist for the Historical Writers Awards – the Debut Crown award – meaning that every book on the list was a first time novel, a new author, a new foray into historical fiction…and I was lucky enough to join some very esteemed judges and be part of this amazing judging process..
The Award:
“This award is for the best historical novel by a first-time fiction author of any nationality first published in the UK in English during the period 1st January 2016 – 31st March 2017”
The Judges:
Working with this bunch of lovely people has just been the best experience ever. I never knew judging would be so hard! We all had our preferences but the real truth came out in the discussions where we weighed each and every novel on its own merits. This was not an easy process as you can imagine. But you know the most exciting part? The range of novels which were submitted to us. The length and breadth of time periods, scope, level of research and such immersive novels. Some I might not have read had it not been for this award.
The discussions were lengthy and detailed – I think everyone wanted to be sure that each novel got their time in the spotlight and I can assure all writers that they did. I had the best time reading them all and then writing down what I thought and commenting on the historical attributes of each one, the writing style, the plot…everything. The most detailed reviews I’ve ever done but it helped me as a reader too to delve into this genre in so much depth.
The BookTrails:
Some were reviewed prior to their being in the awards but this has no bearing on reading them for the judging process.
The Bear and the Nightingale – Katherine Arden
Mussolini’s Island – Sarah Day
The Midnight Watch – David Dyer
The Translation of Love – Lynne Kutsukake
The Solitary Woman of Shakespeare – James Terry
Girl Waits with Gun – Amy Stewart
The Witchfinder’s Sister – Beth Underdown
Congratulations to everyone who made the longlist – you gave us quite the challenge but it was the best one I’ve ever been involved in. A fascinating process . Thanks also to my fellow judges. It’s been am absolute pleasure.
Read about the other longlists here – Historicalwriters.org/hwa-crowns-2017-longlists/
