In such a strange year, when everything we thought we knew had to change, we were delighted to have such a positive response to our online award ceremony, hosted by longstanding Prize partner Ilkley Literature Festival.
The award event featured our Prize Director, Fiona Goh, introducing the Prize, and we also heard from Kit de Waal, acclaimed novelist and 2014 SI Readers’ Choice winner, and Prize Patron Bidisha, about what the Prize means to them.
Always a highlight of the award event, the ceremony featured our wonderful shortlisted writers reading extracts from their work: LM Dillsworth, Sumana Khan, Wenyan Lu, Aisha Phoenix, Nana Afua Pierre and Huma Qureshi.
Chair of Judges, Nicola Chang told us a little bit more about the judging process and announced the winning entries:
- The Aspire-igen 1st Prize award went to Wenyan Lu for The Funeral Cryer
- 2nd Prize went to LM Dillsworth for The Sun Sets in the East
- 3rd Prize went to Sumana Khan for The Good Twin.
The SI Readers’ Choice award, for the favourite entry from the shortlist, chosen by some 40 members of the public, primarily members of Soroptimist International, went to Sumana Khan for The Good Twin. Many congratulations to all our shortlisted writers, and we are hugely looking forward to supporting them in the next stage of their writing careers – and to seeing their works on our bookshelves in future!
Please watch the full ceremony here.
This is the shorter announcement, including Nicola Chang’s speech and Wenyan Lu’s reading:
