Science-fiction writer Chris Beckett has won The Edge Hill Prize, awarded annually for a single author short story collection by Edge Hill University. Others on the shortlist included Booker winner Anne Enright and Whitbread winner Ali Smith.You can read an extract from Beckett's collection, The Turing Test here.
Beckett says he was still pinching himself at the win, and added :
I ... thought that being a science fiction writer could count against me: a lot of people don't like it, or look at it in some way as less than literary fiction. It's a little blow for the genre, as well as for me – it might persuade a few people that maybe it's worth looking at.Judge James Walton said that Beckett's entry had been the most enjoyable and impressive read:
It was Beckett who seemed to us to have written the most imaginative and endlessly inventive stories, fizzing with ideas and complete with strong characters and big contemporary themes. We also appreciated the sheer zest of his storytelling and the obvious pleasure he had taken in creating his fiction.
3 comments:
This is a great blog; glad I found your site. Check out my first and recently released novel, Long Journey to Rneadal. This exciting tale is a romantic action adventure in space and is more about the characters than the technology.
Any idea where I can get Beckett's collection? It's not on Kinokuniya or MPH list.
i'd like it too! you can always try to order it from your favourite bookshop (though they will not be able to bring it in if the distributors here don't have a link with the publisher) or, of course, buy online e.g.
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