Awards

2007

Restless, William Boyd

A Richard and Judy's Book Club Choice for 2007.  Winner of the Costa Novel of the Year Award 2007.

It is 1939. Eva Delectorskaya is a beautiful 28-year-old Russian émigrée living in Paris. As war breaks out she is recruited for the British Secret Service by Lucas Romer, a mysterious Englishman and under his tutelage she learns to become the perfect spy, to mask her emotions and trust no one, including those she loves most. Since then Eva has carefully rebuilt her life as the very English wife and mother Sally Gilmartin — but once a spy, always a spy. Now she must complete one final assignment. This time though Eva can’t do it alone: she needs her daughter’s help.

Imperial Life in the Emerald City, Rajiv Chandrasekaran

Winner of the BBC Samuel Johnson Prize for Non-Fiction

From a walled-off enclave of towering plants, smart villas and sparkling swimming pools — a surreal bubble of pure Americana known as the Green Zone — the US-led Coalition Provisional Authority, under imperial viceroy L. Paul Bremer III, attempted to rule Iraq in the first twelve months after the fall of Saddam Hussein’s regime.

My Side of The Story, Will Davis

Winner of the Betty Trask Award

Jaz’s parents have just discovered he’s gay — having somehow failed to notice the shrine to Orlando Bloom in his bedroom. Not only that, but his best (girl)friend Al has outed him on the school bus by mistake. So now he’s being shipped off for therapy, mocked by a gang of delinquent neo-Nazi schoolboys, disapproved of by his whiter-than-white sister (aka The Nun) and worst of all, keeps meeting his geography teacher in the local gay club. There’s masses and masses of hassle to come, but this is pretty much where it all begins.

The Last Mughal, William Dalrymple

Winner of the Duff Cooper Prize

At 4pm on a dark, wet winter’s evening in November 1862, a cheap coffin was buried in eerie silence: no lamentations, no panegyrics, for as the British Commissioner in charge of the funeral insisted, ‘No vesting will remain to distinguish where the last of the Great Moghuls rests.’ This Mughal was Bahadur Shah Zafar II, one of the most talented, tolerant and likeable of his remarkable dynasty who found himself leader of a violent uprising he knew from the start would lead to irreparable carnage. Zafar’s frantic efforts to unite his forces proved tragically futile. The Siege of Delhi was the Raj’s Stalingrad, and Mughal Delhi was left an empty ruin. The Last Mughal charts the desecration and demise of a man, his dynasty, his city and civilizations mercilessly ravished by fractured forces and vengeful British troops.

2006

Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince wins Book of the Year Nibbie
30/3/2006

Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince by J.K. Rowling is this year's WH Smith Book of the Year.

The award was presented at the 2006 British Book Awards on 29th March.  Click here to see pictures from the awards ceremony on the Nibbies website. The awards will be televised on Saturday 1 April at 6.00pm on Channel 4. The programme will be repeated on More4 on Sunday 2 April at 5.00pm.

The sixth and penultimate book in the Harry Potter series did not disappoint fans, stirring up even more excitement among children and adults alike than ever before. In the previous book, Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix, the last chapter, titled 'The Second War Begins,' started: "In a brief statement on Friday night, Minister for Magic Cornelius Fudge confirmed that He Who Must Not Be Named has returned to this country and is once more active. 'It is with great regret that I must confirm that the wizard styling himself Lord — well, you know who I mean — is alive and among us again,' said Fudge." Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince takes up the story of Harry Potter's sixth year at Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry at this point as Voldemort's power and followers are increasing day by day, in the midst of this battle of good and evil.

Find out more about the books at www.bloomsbury.com/harrypotter.

2005

Bloomsbury authors triumph at 2005 British Book Awards
17/4/2005

Two Bloomsbury authors were the winners of coveted 'Nibbies' at the 2005 British Book Awards last night at the Grosvenor House Hotel, London.

Sheila Hancock was the winner of the 2005 Author of the Year Award for The Two of Us, her bestselling memoir of her life with the actor John Thaw.

Susanna Clarke, author of the UK and US bestseller Jonathan Strange & Mr Norrell, won the 2005 Newcomer of the Year Award. Jonathan Strange & Mr Norrell was shortlisted for the Whitbread First Novel Award, the Guardian First Book Award, was also for the longlisted 2004 Man Booker Prize.

Click here to find out more about other winners at the 2005 British Book Awards.

Trade awards for Jonathan Strange & Mr Norrell

Bloomsbury Publishing was also the winner of two major trade awards for Sales and Marketing Campaign of the Year and Publicity Campaign of the Year for the campaigns for Jonathan Strange & Mr Norrell by Susanna Clarke, and was also nominated in two other categories: the Design and Production Award (Will Webb, also for Jonathan Strange & Mr Norrell) and the Award for Industry Achievement (Thomas Bonneville, Operations Manager).

The Sales and Marketing Campaign of the Year award was won by the Bloomsbury marketing team, led by Minna Fry — their third award in five years after winning the prize in 2003 for the campaign for Schott's Original Miscellany and Donna Tartt's The Little Friend and previous to that for the campaign Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire. Katie Bond, Publicity Director at Bloomsbury was the winner of the Publicity Campaign of the Year Award.

Click here to find out more about the winners of the 2005 British Book Trade Awards.