Today, the Nero Book Awards announce its four winners for the 2024 Awards. The Nero Book Awards celebrates the best books and outstanding writing from the UK and Ireland across four different categories: Fiction, Non-Fiction, Debut Fiction and Children's Fiction. This year's category winners showcase the quality of the writing and craftsmanship in literature, with something in the books chosen for readers of all tastes. 

The Nero Book Awards are run by the independent family-owned coffee house group Caffè Nero as not-for-profit in partnership with The Bookseller Association and Brunel University London. It is the aim of the Nero Book Awards to help readers of all ages and interests discover outstanding books and writers. This Book Awards is the only set of multi-category awards that is open exclusively to writers based in the UK and Ireland. 

The winners from each category have been chosen by expert judging panels made up of authors, booksellers and journalists who picked their best books of the year from the shortlisted sixteen titles.

The category winners for this year's awards include a magical, folklore and science filled children's book, a darkly comic debut by an award winning short story writer, an eerie and dreamlike folk horror novel of three friends on a perilous journey to a forbidden place and the true story of a couple that were stranded at sea for 118 days.

The winners in each category for the 2024 Nero Book Awards are:

The Nero Book Awards Fiction Winner 2024

Lost in the Garden by Adam S. Leslie

The judges said: “A surprising folk horror about everyday encounters with the incredible. Vulnerable, rooted characters come of age in a hazy, hypnotic book that reflects contemporary Britain through a distorted lens.”

The Nero Book Awards Non-Fiction Winner 2024

Maurice and Maralyn: An Extraordinary True Story of Shipwreck, Survival and Love by Sophie Elmhirst

The judges thought this was “A captivating gem of creative non-fiction writing that grips both as a human survival story, and as a profound, almost mythical tale of the wide blue yonder and the things that sustain us in times of crisis.”

Awarded a LoveReading Star Book, Liz Robinson called this "the most wonderfully personal and yet epic biography detailing the fascinating life of an English couple who fought for survival in the middle of the Pacific Ocean." Highly recommended, Maurice and Maralyn is a truly lovely yet gripping story of an ordinary turned extraordinary couple, what an adventure! 

The Nero Book Awards Debut Fiction Winner 2024

Wild Houses by Colin Barrett

When discussing the Wild Houses the judges said: “Our winner Wild Houses was a clear stand-out for the sheer quality of its writing; a literary page-turner, with prose both lyrical and absorbing, brilliant dialogue and characters who seem to have walked off the street and onto the page. The wit and humour in this novel belies an undercurrent of menace, and yet there is deep empathy and compassion at its heart.”

The Nero Book Awards Children’s Fiction Winner 2024

The Twelve by Liz Hyder

The judges described this book as: “Beautiful characterisation, compelling storytelling, this is a book for now and all time – an immersive time-travel adventure that will keep readers hooked.”

The category winners will receive £5,000 and will now be in the running for the Nero Gold Prize which was won by The Bee Sting by Paul Murray in 2023. Renowned and award-winning author Bill Bryson will chair this year's judging panel selecting the overall winner. The winner will be announced at a ceremony on the 5th March in London. The Nero Gold Prize winner will receive an additional £30,000 prize. 

To find out more about The Nero Book Awards, visit: https://nerobookawards.com/

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