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the college. Addicted to fiction since childhood, Lindsey has spent her working life thinking, talking and writing about it.
“Women are very, very good at fiction” Lindsey says “and it is a privilege and a huge pleasure to be involved in awarding this prize.” Madeleine graduated from the University of St Andrews with a degree in English Literature and Language in 2004, going on to work for an independent publishing company Trojan Books in Berlin and the oldest literary agency in the UK where she specialised in foreign rights. Prior to having her own agency, Madeleine was the Head of Rights and a Literary Agent at the most commercial agency in the UK where she had three best-sellers. Reading the 200 scripts was a truly marathon task, which Lindsey achieved by assigning a number per day, often reading all day, for most of March and April. It was then Madeleine’s job to read the top 30 before the two judges compared their decisions. ‘By a miracle’ Lindsey tells us ‘we chose the same top 5’: on 6th May our short-list was announced.
A quick run through the short-listed entries; all were exciting and all could-have won. Lilian Butterwick’s A Silent World, written for young adults, is set on the bleak Lancashire moors in a dysfunctional near-future after the bees have gone. Annette Gordon’s When I was Loved is a novel about survival, control and trust, the balance and flow of money in relationships, and the complex psychology of love. In The Second Garden Joanna Merifield creates a miniature portrait of a family who experience extreme pain owing to the loss of a child, a story which is told through the eyes of their teenage daughter Stella. Anni Domingo’s Breaking the Maafa Chain is a historical novel about slavery and survival, set in the mid-nineteenth century. It tells the story of two sisters, Fatmata and Salimatu, who are captured during a raid on their village and go on to lead very different lives as a slave and as an English princess. Gail Honeyman’s Eleanor Oliphant is the story of a troubled young woman trying to come to terms with her tragic past, cope with the challenges she faces day-to-day, and map out some kind of happier future, while life (past and present) continues to get in the way.
Fiction Prize shortlist winner 2014, Joanna Merifield
Choosing a winner from among these sparkling entries was clearly no easy task for Lindsey and Madeleine – I had a read too and would have been hard pressed to choose; however, after a considerable amount of deliberation, the two judges did pick a winner: Joanna Merifield for The Second Garden. A few months after the competition all shortlisted entrants are doing very well. Joanna Merifield has had interest from several agents and, spurred on by her win, is now pushing forward to complete her novel. She tells us she’d like to complete it soon “not least because there are other novel ideas circling in my head like aeroplanes, and they are impatient for instruction from traffic control!” Anni says “thank you Lucy Cavendish College for helping me to find a fantastic agent!” Anni Domingo was thrilled to tell us that Madeleine Milburn is going to represent her from now on.
Sophie Hannah is a big supporter of the Fiction Prize
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The shortlist make their way over to the dinner find out who is the winner
We are very happy to announce that the publisher Peter, Fraser and Dunlop have generously agreed to fund the final 2015 Fiction Prize. The judges this coming year include Allison Pearson, Nelle Andrews and Adele Geras. Next year will be my last year as President of Lucy Cavendish. Our college has been kind in indulging my passion for contemporary literature with the annual Women’s Word Festival and the Fiction Prize, both of which have required considerable time and work from the President’s Office. My especial thanks to Sophie Hannah, Joy Haughton, Clare Wartnaby, Helen Taylor and Jeanette Ariano. I am sure the next President will want to go in other exciting directions.
Professor Janet Todd OBE President jt272@cam.ac.uk
And more good news from a 2012 short-listed entrant, Kathyrn Simmonds. A copy of her recently published novel Love and Fallout just arrived in the post at Lucy Cavendish.
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