Monthly Archives: June 2010
Peter Temple’s Truth, published by Quercus in paperback earlier this month, has made history by becoming the first work of crime fiction to win the prestigious Miles Franklin Award, Australia’s most important literary prize.
”I’m surprised and greatly honoured at joining such a list of illustrious names,” said Temple, 64, from Ballarat, after receiving the $42,000 prize, announced at the State Library of New South Wales.
”Winning the Miles Franklin is the high point in an Australian writer’s career. I think that winning this award will do a lot for crime fiction and I feel very honoured to be among such a long list of illustrious writers.”
Truth triumphed over five other shortlisted novels: Lovesong by Alex Miller, The Bath Fugues by Brian Castro, Jasper Jones by Craig Silvey, The Book of Emmett by Deborah Forster and Butterfly by Sonya Hartnett. The judges said Truth was ”a stunning novel about contemporary Australian life, written with all the ambiguity and moral sophistication of the most memorable literature”.
Quercus children’s authors Sarah Prineas (The Magic Thief) and Bernard Beckett (Genesis) will be linking to classrooms across the UK from Iowa, USA and Wellington, New Zealand this summer using Skype.
Prineas and Beckett are scheduled to talk to more than 25 classrooms this year across London, Ipswich, Manchester and Dublin.
We are thrilled that Bernard Beckett has won the 2010 Prix Sorcières prize in France with his book, Genesis. The author won in the young adult category with a novel that has been described as strikingly original and hugely ambitious.
Past winners of the Prix Sorcières, a prestigious and annual French literary award, include Anthony Browne, Anne Fine, Michael Morpurgo and J.K Rowling.
It is the latest in a long line of top literary prizes that the author has picked up with the book. Previous accolades received by Beckett include the 2007 Esther Glen Award and the 2007 New Zealand Post Children’s Book Award. In the UK Beckett was nominated for the 2009 Guardian Children’s Fiction Prize and the 2010 UKLA Book Award.
After sales rose across the board last week Quercus continued to see strong sales in the UK market in the week ending June 5th.
Stieg Larsson’s The Girl Who Kicked the Hornets’ Nest remained at #2 on the Paperback Fiction chart with sales of nearly 25,000. The two paperback editions of The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo sold a combined total in excess of 24,000, placing it at #3 on the same chart. The Girl Who Played with Fire took #5 with sales of approximately 22,000.
William Nicholson’s The Secret Intensity of Everyday Life was our next bestselling fiction title, and we expect great things for this novel as it goes on sale in supermarkets later in the month.
We have similar expectations for Jungle Soldier by Brian Moynahan, which as our bestselling non fiction title is already off to a wonderful start with sales up 62% week-on-week.
Bernard Beckett is a provocative and inventive writer for young adults. Genesis is his seventh novel and has been published in 23 countries.
To date Genesis has picked up the 2007 New Zealand Post Book Award for Young Adults and the 2009 NZ Esther Glen Award as well as nominations for the 2009 Guardian Children’s Fiction Prize and the 2010 UK Literacy Association Book Award.
The Genesis Teacher’s Pack is a comprehensive guide for using Genesis across KS3 and AS/ A level teaching for the following subjects: English, Science, Drama Psychology, History and Citizenship.
The Genesis Reader’s Pack can be used to accompany the book in reading groups and classrooms. It offers author’s notes, an alternative opening, reading group questions and debate topics.
