Bookshops across the UK & Ireland have nominated their top authors and books of 2022
Who better to curate a shortlist of wonderful books than booksellers? The Readers Awards are the only book awards with a shortlist curated by booksellers, and today the public vote opens, when you are being encouraged to choose the titles and authors you would like to win.
Is your book of the year not on the list? Fear not, this is where the Readers’ Choice category comes in—nominate your favourite title as the winner.
Votes are open here until 11pm on Sunday 30th October.
The shortlist includes the exhilarating gaming-inspired novel Tomorrow, Tomorrow and Tomorrow by best-selling author Gabrielle Zevin; poet, playwright, broadcaster and author, Lemm Sissay OBE for his collection The Fire People; British-Somali poet Warsan Shire, author of Bless the Daughter Raised by a Voice in Her Head; Grimwood: Let the Fur Fly, a bestselling comedy adventure from Nadia Shireen; Kit de Waal for her childhood memoir, Without Warning and Only Sometimes: Scenes from an Unpredictable Childhood, set to become a classic; and much-loved author, illustrator and screenwriter Alice Oseman, creator of the Heartstopper series.
THE SHORTLIST
Fiction
Heaven by Mieko Kawakami (Pan Macmillan)
Her Majesty’s Royal Coven by Juno Dawson (HarperCollins Publishers)
Our Wives Under the Sea by Julia Armfield (Pan Macmillan)
Tomorrow, and Tomorrow, and Tomorrow by Gabrielle Zevin (Vintage Publishing)
Non-Fiction
Ghost Signs by Stu Hennigan (Bluemoose Books)
Otherlands: A World in the Making by Dr Thomas Halliday (Penguin Books)
The Transgender Issue by Shon Faye (Penguin Books)
Without Warning and Only Sometimes by Kit de Waal (Headline Publishing Group)
Poetry
Bless the Daughter Raised by a Voice in her Head by Warsan Shire (Vintage Publishing)
The Fire People: A Collection of British Black and Asian Poetry by Lemn Sissay (Canongate Books Ltd)
Limbic by Peter Scalpello (Cipher Press)
100 Queer Poems edited by Mary Jean Chan and Andrew McMillan (Vintage Publishing)
Young Adult Fiction
All That’s Left in the World by Erik J Brown (Hachette Children’s Group)
I Kissed Shara Wheeler by Casey McQuiston (Pan Macmillan)
The King is Dead by Benjamin Dean (Simon & Schuster Ltd)
When Our Worlds Collided by Danielle Jawando (Simon & Schuster Ltd)
Children’s Fiction
Grimwood: Let the Fur Fly by Nadia Shireen (Simon & Schuster) Ltd
Like a Charm by Elle McNicoll (Knights Of Media)
Loki: A Bad God’s Guide to Being Good by Louie Stowell (Walker Books Ltd)
Skandar and the Unicorn Thief by A.F. Steadman (Simon & Schuster Ltd)
Breakthrough Author
Mieko Kawakami, author of Heaven, All the Lovers in the Night, and Breasts and Eggs
(Pan Macmillan)
Alice Oseman, creator of the Heartstopper series (Hachette and HarperCollins)
Jamie Smart, creator of the Bunny vs Monkey series (David Fickling Books)
Gabrielle Zevin, author of Tomorrow, and Tomorrow, and Tomorrow (Vintage Publishing)
The winners will be announced on Tuesday 8th November at an awards ceremony at Foyles on Charing Cross Road, hosted by Radzi Chinyanganya.