Novelists Donal Ryan, Colin Barrett, broadcaster Zeinab Badawi and children’s and young adult author Patrick Ness are among those shortlisted for this year’s Nero awards.
A total of 16 books were shortlisted across the four categories of fiction, debut fiction, nonfiction and children’s fiction. Winners of each category will be announced on 14 January 2025 and receive £5,000, and an overall winner of the Nero Gold prize will be revealed on 5 March and win an additional £30,000.
The awards are run by Caffè Nero, and launched after Costa Coffee abruptly ended its book prizes in June 2022. The prizes are aimed at pointing readers “of all ages and interests in the direction of the most outstanding books and writers of the year”.
Ryan was shortlisted in the fiction category for Heart, Be at Peace, a state-of-the-nation novel set in rural Ireland and told in 21 voices. The book is a follow-up to his debut The Spinning Heart, which won the 2013 Guardian first book award.
Adam S Leslie was shortlisted in the same category for Lost in the Garden, about a surreal expedition through the English countryside. Completing the fiction shortlist are The Hypocrite by Jo Hamya and Levitation for Beginners by Suzannah Dunn.
Fiction
Levitation for Beginners by Suzannah Dunn (Abacus)
The Hypocrite by Jo Hamya (Weidenfeld)
Lost in the Garden by Adam S Leslie (Dead Ink)
Heart, Be at Peace by Donal Ryan (Doubleday)
Nonfiction
Pixel Flesh by Ellen Atlanta (Headline)
An African History of Africa by Zeinab Badawi (WH Allen)
Maurice and Maralyn by Sophie Elmhirst (Chatto)
All That Glitters by Orlando Whitfield (Profile)
Debut fiction
Wild Houses by Colin Barrett (Cape)
Monumenta by Lara Haworth (Canongate)
Glorious Exploits by Ferdia Lennon (Fig Tree)
No Small Thing by Orlaine McDonald (Serpent’s Tail)
Children's fiction
Bird Boy by Catherine Bruton (Nosy Crow)
How to Survive a Horror Movie by Scarlet Dunmore (Little Tiger)
The Twelve by Liz Hyder, illustrated by Tom De Freston (Pushkin)
Chronicles of a Lizard Nobody by Patrick Ness, illustrated by Tim Miller (Walker)
All four books shortlisted in the nonfiction category are by debut authors. Ellen Atlanta’s Pixel Flesh explores the impact of social media on beauty standards, while Guardian Long Read contributor Sophie Elmhirst’s Maurice and Maralyn tells the story of a British couple who were lost at sea for 117 days in the 1970s after their boat was struck by a whale.
Badawi – a news broadcaster who is also the president of SOAS – was shortlisted for An African History of Africa, while Orlando Whitfield was nominated for All That Glitters, about an art fraudster.
This year’s Waterstones debut fiction prize winner Ferdia Lennon was shortlisted in the Nero debut category with Glorious Exploits, which is set in 412BC Syracuse in the aftermath of Athens’ failed invasion of Sicily.
Joining Lennon on the debut fiction shortlist is Orlaine McDonald for No Small Thing, Lara Haworth for Monumenta, and short-story writer Barrett for his first novel Wild Houses, which was longlisted for this year’s Booker prize.
Ness made the children’s fiction list for Chronicles of a Lizard Nobody, illustrated by Tim Miller. “Ness’s brio turns the school travails of a group of monitor lizards into a bonkers, yet convincing story about difference – and giant killer robots,” wrote reviewer Kitty Empire in the Observer. Bird Boy by Catherine Bruton, How to Survive a Horror Movie by Scarlet Dunmore and The Twelve by Liz Hyder, illustrated by Tom de Freston, were also shortlisted in the children’s category.
To be eligible for the 2024 awards, books had to have been published in English in the UK or Ireland between 1 December 2023 and 30 November 2024, and written by authors resident in the UK or Ireland for the past three years. Judges were asked to choose which books they would highly recommend from hundreds of titles submitted. This year’s judging panels include the writers Patrice Lawrence, Louise Doughty, Kevin Power and Guardian columnist Rhik Samadder.
“There is extraordinary writing talent in the UK and Ireland and our judges have worked tirelessly to find 16 outstanding books based on the quality of their writing and their readability,” said Caffè Nero founder and CEO Gerry Ford. “We received an overwhelming number of entries this year, so I know it was no small feat to choose just 16 for the shortlists.”
Last year, Paul Murray won the inaugural fiction category award and overall Gold prize for his Booker-shortlisted novel The Bee Sting. Meanwhile Michael Magee won the debut fiction category with Close To Home, Fern Brady took the nonfiction prize for Strong Female Character and Beth Lincoln was selected as winner of the children’s fiction category with The Swifts, illustrated by Claire Powell.
