Call for submissions for the Bristol Festival of Ideas 2013 Best Book of Ideas

Date posted: 30 November 12

30 November 2012

Bristol Cultural Development Partnership launched today the call for submissions for the Bristol Festival of Ideas 2013 Best Book of Ideas prize sponsored by Foyles.

The prize is awarded to the book first published in the UK in 2012 which presents new, important and challenging ideas, which is rigorously argued, and which is engaging and accessible.

Publishers can submit up to five books per imprint which meets this criteria. The judges will also call in books that they feel should be considered and which may not have been submitted.

The judges are:

Writer and broadcaster Bidisha. Bidisha began writing professionally for arts magazines at the age of 15. Her first novel, Seahorses, was published while she was studying Old and Middle English at Oxford. She was one of the judges for the 2009 Orange Prize for Fiction and one of the judges of the 2010 John Llewellyn Rhys Prize. She was on the committee for World Book Night 2011. Her most recent book is Beyond the Wall: Writing a Path Through Palestine.

Andrew Kelly, Director, Bristol Festival of Ideas. Andrew is the author of 12 books and has contributed to others. A new edition of his Cinema and the Great War will be published in early 2014.

Writer and broadcaster Sian Norris. Sian co-ordinates the Bristol Feminist Network and is the founder of the Bristol Women’s Literature Festival. In 2011 she set up a self-publishing imprint, Crooked Rib Publishing, and released The Light Bulb Moment, an anthology of women’s and men’s experience of feminism. Her children’s book Greta and Boris: a Daring Rescue will be published by Our Street books in spring 2013. She writes for a range of publications and websites.

Professor Peter Rawlings, Head, Department of Arts, University of the West of England. Peter’s principal research focus is American fiction at the turn of the nineteenth century, especially the work of Henry James. He has also written on the poetry of Philip Larkin, the American reception of Shakespeare, English and American travel writing, narratology, and literary responses to crises in masculinity.

Previous winners of the Best Book of Ideas include Edgelands by Paul Farley and Michael Symmons Roberts (2012) and Dan Hind’s The Return of the Public (2011) (further details available HERE).

Timetable:

7 January 2013: Submissions deadline

15 April 2013: Shortlist announced

20 May 2013: Winner announced

Submission process

Please send six copies of each book submitted to:

Andrew Kelly, Bristol Festival of Ideas, BCDP, Leigh Court, Abbots Leigh, Bristol BS8 3RA

Books should have been first published in the UK in calendar year 2012, by British writers and British-based writers, either born in the UK or resident in the UK for the year of the award (calendar year 2012). Although the deadline is 7 January, please submit books as soon as you can.

If possible please send the list of books you plan to submit first to andrew.kelly@businesswest.co.uk