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25 July 2025

Lucy Steeds wins the 2025 Waterstones Debut Fiction Prize

The Artist by Lucy Steeds has won the 2025 Waterstones Debut Fiction Prize. 

The book is set over one sweltering summer during the 1920s, and focuses on an enigmatic painter, the young British journalist set on penning a piece on him, and the artist’s seemingly unworldly niece. As the young man sets out to write his piece on the great and terrifying painter, tensions between the three come to a dramatic conclusion.

Bea Carvalho, Waterstones head of books, said: “It is a great pleasure to announce that Waterstones booksellers have chosen Lucy Steeds as the winner of the 2025 Waterstones Debut Fiction Prize for her novel The Artist. From a shortlist of six stunning books, The Artist stood out for its atmospheric, sensory prose, and its headily evocative sense of time and place. It is a stylish, elegant treat of a novel which seamlessly transports the reader to sun-soaked southern France, weaving mystery with romance, while delving into the complex nature of artistry. Lucy Steeds is a writer of rare talent: she is able to conjure vivid brushstrokes, sticky heat, and the smells and tastes of Provence, through words on the page. This is a gorgeously claus...

10 June 2025

Yuval Zommer wins Prix UNICEF de Littérature Jeunesse 2025

Yuval Zommer has been named as one of the winners of the Prix UNICEF de Littérature Jeunesse 2025. Zommer's book The Wild (Natura in French) was named as the winner of the the 3-5 year old category and one of 4 winning books voted for by 40,838 children.

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13 May 2025

RCW authors triumph at the British Book Awards 2025

The 35th British Book Awards saw Percival Everett being awarded The Fiction Book of the Year for James, a reimagining of Mark Twain’s The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn. Judges called James a “future classic”, a “gripping, stunning” and “beautifully executed” story. When crowning James the winner, the panel of judges agreed that the story delivers “the message the world needs right now”. Everett was also named as Author of the Year, with “the past 12 months cementing his position as one of the great literary novelists of our time”.

Butter by Asako Yuzuki, translated by Polly Barton, was awarded The Debut: Fiction prize. The judges found the story “evocative” and “wonderfully” executed.

Julia Donaldson and Axel Scheffler were awarded the Children’s Illustrated prize for Jonty Gentoo: The Adventures of a Penguin. The panel praised the duo’s tale of a plucky penguin for its “celebration of conservation” and “effortless rhyming” narrative.

Hunted by Abir Mukherjee was awarded the Book of the Year – Crime & Thriller award.

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