Newsletter: March 2008

February's been a month of prizes and plaudits, both of the glitzy and glamorous, and the quirky and humorous varieties. Here's a brief round-up...

All of you who enjoy a happy ending and a pastel-coloured cover (and there's no shame in that) will be interested to know that this year's Romantic Novel of the Year Award went to Freya North (pictured below), a self-confessed writer of 'feisty romps'. Her book Pillow Talk picked up the award, organised by the Romantic Novelists' Association.

 Photo: RNA

There was some comment in the UK media that this year's Oscars ceremony was less crowd-pleasing than most. It was also, if you ask me, more interesting. Film versions of novels by Cormac McCarthy (No Country for Old Men), Ian McEwan (Atonement), Philip Pullman (The Golden Compass), Robert Ludlum (The Bourne Ultimatum), and Upton Sinclair (There Will Be Blood) all took gongs.

A somewhat less glitzy award ceremony is on the cards for the annual Diagram Prize, which honours remarkably titled books. Despite the considerable publicity for the books on this year's shortlist - namely, I Was Tortured by the Pygmy Love Queen; How to Write a How to Write Book; Are Women Human? And Other International Dialogues; Cheese Problems Solved; If You Want Closure in Your Relationship, Start with Your Legs; and People who Mattered in Southend and Beyond: From King Canute to Dr Feelgood - one has to wonder whether sales will be as positively affected by award success as those of the Oscar tie-ins will undoubtedly be... If you're lucky you might still have time to hot foot it over to The Bookseller's website and cast your vote for your favourite title. The winner will be announced on 28th March.

And in more prizes-to-come, Salman Rushdie is to be pitted against all the other winners of the Booker Prize to find the 'Best of the Booker'. Rushdie's Midnight's Children was named the best Booker winner in the prize's first 25 years, and now that it's reached the grand old age of 40, the organisers have decided it's time for a recount. A panel of judges are going to wade through all the winners from the last forty years, and come up with a shortlist of six which the public will get to vote on. Will one of the more recent winners take the overall title? The Life of Pi, perhaps? Apparently some bookmakers are already listing it as favourite...

Finally, not so much a prize than a gimmick, but The Times recently announced it had ranked the fifty best British post-war writers. The top spots go to Philip Larkin, George Orwell, William Golding, Ted Hughes and Doris Lessing. Salman Rushdie comes in at number thirteen, and Ian McEwan at number thirty-five. The idea, of course, is to get everyone talking...

Susan Tranter

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