Kerry Group and Listowel Writers’ Week are delighted to announce the shortlist for the Kerry Group Novel of the Year Award 2017 which includes three debut novels.
The award is for the best novel by an Irish author published between 1st February 2016 and 1st February 2017 with a prize of €15,000 for the winning author – the largest monetary prize awarded for fiction and available solely for Irish writers.
“Kerry Group is delighted to continue its sponsorship of the Kerry Group Irish Novel of the Year Award 2017” said Frank Hayes, Director of Corporate Affairs. “Now in its 22nd year, this prestigious award continues to recognise Ireland’s leading literary talent. The five exceptional novels shortlisted for this year’s Award will undoubtedly further Ireland’s international reputation and proud literary tradition. I commend our two adjudicators, A L Kennedy and Neel Mukherjee, for compiling this year’s shortlist which showcases a rich and diverse selection of Irish writing”.
The winner will be announced at the opening ceremony of this years’ Listowel Writers’ Week on May 31st 2017 and will be presented with the €15,000 prize.
This year’s adjudicators were novelists AL Kennedy and Neel Mukherjee
Listowel Writers’ Week Festival Chairperson Liz Dunn said “The announcement of the Kerry Group Irish Novel of the Year is always a very exciting time of year for us as we await the adjudicators’
decision. Three of the five shortlisted novelists of 2017 submitted their first novels and this, perhaps, reflects a change in shift of such awards and I find it fascinating that they should be selected from a longlist of such prestigious and well-established authors.”
This year’s short list is:
• Inch Levels by Neil Hegarty.
Publisher Head of Zeus
• My Name is Leon by Kit DE Waal.
Publisher: Penguin, Random House
• The Wonder by Emma Donoghue.
Publisher Picador
• Solar Bones by Mike McCormack.
Publisher: Tramp Press
• Nothing on Earth Conor O’Callaghan.
Publisher Transworld
Listowel Writers’ Week takes place between the 31st May to 4th June 2017 and will be officially opened by author Richard Ford. This year’s festival will feature the usual host of national and international authors such as Colm Tóibín, Margaret Drabble, Alan Cumming, Akhil Sharma, MJ Hyland, Graham Norton, David Szalay, Granta Editor Sigrid Rausing, comedienne Helen Lederer, Paul Howard, Lisa McInerney, Fergal Keane and many more.
