COSTA SHORT STORY AWARD 2015:
Identities of Six Finalists Revealed
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Shortlist includes a playwright, a part-time gym-instructor, a previous Costa
Short Story Award finalist and award-winning novelist Rupert Thomson
Winner has been decided by public vote and will be announced at the Costa
Book Awards ceremony on Tuesday 26th January
London, 18th January 2016: Costa today announces the identities of the six finalists
shortlisted for the 2015 Costa Short Story Award.
Established in 2012, the Award – run in association with the Costa Book Awards but
judged independently of the main five-category system – is judged anonymously ie
without the name of the author being known throughout the process. It is open to
both published and unpublished writers for a single, previously unpublished short
story of up to 4,000 words by an author aged 18 years or over and written in English.
The shortlist of six stories was selected by a panel of judges comprising author
Raffaella Barker; Richard Beard, Director of the National Academy of Writing; Fanny
Blake, novelist, journalist and Books Editor of Woman & Home magazine; Sarah
Franklin, founder of Short Stories Aloud and Senior Lecturer in Publishing at Oxford
Brookes University and Simon Trewin, agent at William Morris Endeavor.
Voting has now closed and Costa is today revealing the names of the six authors
shortlisted for the Award, all of whom have been previously published in some
capacity.
They include a writer and playwright, a part-time gym instructor, a previous Costa
Short Story Award finalist and a critically-acclaimed novelist and former Costa Novel
Award shortlistee.
The six shortlisted authors are:
Niall Bourke for Gerardo Dreams of Chillies: Niall Bourke is 34 and originally from
Kilkenny in Ireland. He now lives in London, where he teaches English at St
Michael’s College in Bermondsey, and recently completed an MA in creative writing
and teaching at Goldsmiths.
Annalisa Crawford for Watching the Storms Roll In: Annalisa Crawford, from
Saltash in Cornwall, is a part-time gym instructor and the author of two novellas and
a short story collection. Her new collection You. I. Us. will be published in June by
Vine Leaves Press.
Danny Murphy for Rogey: Danny Murphy lives in Stirling and works part-time in
Moray House School of Education at the University of Edinburgh having given up
teaching and headteaching in 2010 to concentrate on his writing. He has written
three books on education and has a book of interlinked short stories and a
psychological thriller underway.
Peggy Riley for The Night Office: Peggy Riley is an author and playwright.
Originally from LA, Peggy now lives on the North Kent coast. Her first novel, Amity &
Sorrow, was a New York Times Book Review Editors’ Choice and her short fiction
has won prizes. As a playwright, her work has been produced off-West End, on the
fringe, and at festivals/on tour throughout the UK. She has been a bookseller, a
festival producer and writer-in-residence at a young offender prison.
Erin Soros for Fallen: Erin Soros, based in Norwich, has published fiction and nonfiction in international journals and anthologies and her stories have been aired on
CBC and the BBC. She has twice been longlisted for the Sunday Times EFG Short
Story Award, been a finalist for the BBC Short Story Award and her story “Still Water,
BC” was a finalist for the 2013 Costa Short Story Award.
Rupert Thomson for To William Burroughs, from His Wife: Rupert Thomson is
the author of ten critically-acclaimed novels, including The Insult, which was chosen
by David Bowie as one of his Top 100 Must-Read books of all time and Death of a
Murderer, which was shortlisted for the 2007 Costa Novel Award. His most recent
novel, Katherine Carlyle was published in November 2015. He lives in London.
The author of the story that received the most public votes will be announced as
winner and receive £3,500 at next week’s Costa Book Awards ceremony, with
second place receiving £1,000 and third place £500.
The inaugural winner of the Costa Short Story Award in 2012 was former prison
manager now full-time writer, Avril Joy, from Witton-le-Wear in Bishop Auckland
whose winning story, Millie and Bird, was included in an anthology of short stories
compiled by Victoria Hislop called The Story: Love Loss and the Lives of Women 100 Great Short Stories (Head of Zeus). She has also since published an e-book,
From Writing with Love.
Writer and poet, Angela Readman from Newcastle won the 2013 Costa Short Story
Award for The Keeper of the Jackalopes. The story featured in her debut short story
collection Don’t Try This at Home, published by & Other Stories in May 2015. 2013
runner-up, Kit de Waal, will publish her debut novel My Name is Leon in June 2016
with Viking and was recently selected by The Observer as one of their New Faces of
Fiction for 2016.
The 2014 winner, writer and PhD student Zoe Gilbert from Sydenham Hill, SouthEast London, received a story commission from Comma Press and been invited to
contribute a story to Birkbeck’s Mechanics’ Institute Review since winning the
competition. She is currently completing her first collection of short stories as well as
a PhD in Creative Writing.
The Costa Book Awards recognise the most enjoyable books of the last year by
writers based in the UK and Ireland. Formerly known as the Whitbread Book
Awards, Costa announced its takeover of the sponsorship of the UK’s prestigious
and popular book prize in 2006.
www.costabookawards.com
For further press information, to arrange an interview with any of the Costa Short Story
Award finalists please contact Amanda Johnson on 07715 922 180 or email
amanda@amandajohnsonpr.com.
Notes for Editors:
About the Costa Short Story Award:
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The Costa Short Story Award was launched in 2012.
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The Costa Short Story Award is for a single, previously unpublished short story of up to 4,000
words by an author aged 18 years or over and written in English.
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The author’s primary residence must have been the UK or Ireland for the past three years.
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The Award runs in association with the Costa Book Awards but is judged independently of the main
five-category system.
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Entrants need not have been previously published but publishers and agents may submit entries on
behalf of authors.
About the Costa Book Awards:
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The Costa Book Awards, formerly the Whitbread Book Awards, were established in 1971 to
encourage, promote and celebrate the best contemporary British writing.
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The total prize fund for the Costa Book Awards – including the Costa Short Story Award - stands at
£60,000.
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The award winners from the five categories - Novel, First Novel, Biography, Poetry and Children’s
Book - each receive £5,000.
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The overall Costa Book of the Year is selected from the five category Award winners with the
winner receiving a further £30,000.
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The winner will be announced at an awards ceremony in central London on 26th January, 2016.
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The 2014 Costa Book of the Year was H is for Hawk by Helen Macdonald (Jonathan Cape).
About Costa:
Founded in London by Italian brothers Sergio and Bruno Costa in 1971, our quality coffee was the premium choice
for boutique hotels and restaurants across the city. Today we continue to roast the original Mocha Italia recipe in Old
Paradise Street, London with our 100% Rainforest Alliance certified coffee remaining at the core of our quality coffee
credentials.
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shop business in the UK. We’re proud to be the UK’s favourite coffee shop, having been awarded “Best Branded
Coffee Shop Chain in the UK and Ireland" by Allegra Strategies for six years running (2010, 2011, 2012, 2013, 2014
& December 2015).
Our people are the heart of our business and we employ over 30,000 people, creating around 1,500 jobs this year
alone and over 4,500 jobs in the next three years in the UK. We continue to be part of the Sunday Times Best
Companies To Work For list, providing skills and training to develop the leaders of the future.
We care about the communities we operate in, which is why we’ve signed up to Keep Britain Tidy’s Litter Prevention
Commitment (Sept 2015) with over 650 stores across the UK taking part in the Big Tidy Up event. Our paper cups
and lids are 100% recyclable and have an insulated design, eliminating the need for paper sleeves to hold hot drinks.
We’re also committed to tackling the UK’s literacy challenge, continuing our partnership of Save the Children’s Born
to Read initiative that aims to ensure that children aged 11 leave primary school with the necessary reading skills to
continue to learn through education.
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registered charity with the aim to relieve poverty, advance education and the health and environment of coffeegrowing communities around the world. So far, The Costa Foundation has funded the building of 53 schools and
improved the social and economic welfare of coffee-growing communities.