The Irish Book Awards have announced a new Book Of The Decade Award and the moving of the full awards to November.
The Book Of The Decade Award is open now for nomination now and will run as follows
Publishers must submit eligible titles by 31st January 2010
A 50-title longlist will then be selected by a panel of experts from the Irish Literary Academy
From April 12th to May 21st the longlist will be promoted in bookstores and libraries
The winning title will be chosen by a public poll conducted via the Irish Book Awards website.
The winning title will be announced on 1st June
Submissions for the award can be for fiction (including Young Adult children’s books) or narrative non-fiction (excluding manuals, picture books, myths & legends and anthologies). Books must have been been published between 1st January 2000 and 31st December 2009. The Author must be Irish. Each publisher can submit up to 12 titles for consideration.
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3 Comments
Hmm. Nice idea – though 50 books seem an awful lot for a longlist in terms of promoting it in bookstores – it might dillute the impact somewhat? I can’t help thinking a max of 20 (ideally 12-15) might have more of an impact in this regard in terms of display / merchandising.
Funny,
I hadn’t thought about the length of that longlist, but then again it is a decade worth!
Eoin
Yes I know – only 5 books per year when you average it out so not many in that sense! Still I just think that with a smaller number a ‘longlist award’ would have a bit more prestige about it. Does it mention how many will be on the shortlist? if it is going to be a large-ish shortlist (e.g. 12 books or so) I can definitely see the merit in such a long longlist (!), but if there will only be 5 or 6 books in the shortlist I think they should have curbed the longlist a little.