The BBC National Short Story Award 2015

The BBC National Short Story Award 2015

by Mark HaddonJeremy Page Hilary Mantel and others
Publication Date: 17/09/2015

Share This eBook:

  $7.00

‘I often ask myself what makes a story work,’ wrote the great

American author, Flannery O’Connor. ‘I have decided that it is

probably some action, some gesture of a character... which is

both totally right and totally unexpected... one that is both in

character and beyond character.’


The five stories shortlisted for this year’s BBC National

Short Story Award with Book Trust all feature people

making just such gestures, acting in ways that reach beyond

themselves: a woman takes refuge from a disastrous

relationship by caring for a morbidly obese man; parents of

a missing girl desperately resort to the services of a woman

whose talents they barely credit; a middle-class resident of a

leafy corner of Windsor finds herself caught at a crossroads

in history; a young man attempts to impress his girlfriend’s

unconventional parents – to excruciating, comic effect; and

a young woman attempts to stitch together her own

approach to life in the face of love. In each case we see an

individual endeavouring to stand up, to make a difference,

to be part of something bigger.


Now in its tenth year, the BBC National Short Story Award

has witnessed a decade of revival for the form, and the stories

on this list show just what fine fettle it’s in. The shortlist was

selected by crime-writer Ian Rankin, novelist Tash Aw, previous

winner Sarah Hall, BBC Books Editor Di Speirs, and former

BBC correspondent and journalist Allan Little, who chaired

the panel and introduces this collection.

ISBN:
1230000668712
1230000668712
Category:
Short stories
Publication Date:
17-09-2015
Language:
English
Publisher:
Comma Press
Mark Haddon

Mark Haddon is a writer and artist. His bestselling novel, The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time, was published simultaneously by Jonathan Cape and David Fickling in 2003. It won seventeen literary prizes, including the Whitbread Award.

In 2012, a stage adaptation by Simon Stephens was produced by the National Theatre and went on to win 7 Olivier Awards in 2013 and the 2015 Tony Award for Best Play. In 2005 his poetry collection, The Talking Horse and the Sad Girl and the Village Under the Sea, was published by Picador, and his play, Polar Bears, was produced by the Donmar Warehouse in 2010.

His most recent novel, The Red House, was published by Jonathan Cape in 2012. The Pier Falls, a collection of short stories, was also published by Cape in 2016. To commemorate the centenary of the Hogarth Press he wrote and illustrated a short story that appeared alongside Virginia Woolf's first story for the press in Two Stories (Hogarth, 2017).

Hilary Mantel

Hilary Mantel is the author of fourteen books, including A Place Of Greater Safety, Beyond Black, the memoir Giving Up The Ghost, and the short-story collection The Assassination Of Margaret Thatcher.

Her two most recent novels, Wolf Hall and its sequel Bring Up The Bodies, have both been awarded the Man Booker Prize - an unprecedented achievement.

Jonathan Buckley

Jonathan Buckley is the acclaimed author of Nostalgia and The Great Concert of the Night.

Live; Live; Live is his eleventh novel. He was the 2015 winner of the BBC National Short Story Award and has also written several guidebooks to various parts of Italy. He lives in Hove.

Frances Leviston

Frances Leviston is the author of two collections of poetry: Public Dream, shortlisted for the T. S. Eliot Prize, the Forward Prize for Best First Collection and the Jerwood-Aldeburgh First Collection Prize; and Disinformation, shortlisted for the Dylan Thomas Prize. In 2015 she was shortlisted for the BBC Short Story Award. She lives in Durham and is a lecturer in creative writing at the University of Manchester.

This item is delivered digitally

You can find this item in:

Show more Show less

Reviews

Be the first to review The BBC National Short Story Award 2015.