AL Kennedy wins Costa Book of the Year
Former Booker Judge wins major literary prize
24 January 2008
The Scottish novelist, and former Booker judge, AL Kennedy has won the 2007 Costa Book of the Year award for her novel Day.
Day is AL Kennedy’s fifth novel (Cape) and tells the story of a former RAF prisoner-of-war returning to Germany to confront his demons.
AL Kennedy, who interrupted her US tour to attend the awards ceremony in London, won the top £25,000 prize, having already won £5,000 for winning the ‘Costa Best Novel’ category.
The 42 year-old Glasgow-based author beat off competition from Simon Sebag Montefiore, Catherine O’Flynn (longlisted for the Man Booker Prize 2007), Jean Sprackland and Ann Kelly.
Joanna Trollope, chair of the final judges, said: “‘Day’ is an example of excellence in its category and a book ultimately to recommend. It is perfectly and beautifully written by an author who is an extraordinary stylist.”
Born in Dundee, AL Kennedy is also a regular newspaper commentator, an academic and in recent years has become a stand-up comedian. Kennedy was a judge on the 1996 Booker Prize judging panel, chaired by Carmen Callil.
At the awards, Kennedy praised Catherine O’Flynn’s novel What Was Lost which many on the night referred to as the runner up. ”It was a very close-run thing,” she said.
The Costa book prize, formerly known as the Whitbread prize, awards five category winners – novel, first novel, biography, children’s book and poetry – and the overall winner of the five categories takes the £25,000 prize. This is the eighth time a novel has won.
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