News
14th Aug 2012
Orange Prize Lives On
Earlier this year, the Orange Prize for Fiction revealed that it would be losing its main sponsor.
The news was announced shortly before the 2012 prize was awarded to Madeline Miller (pictured) in May.
There were some calls from hecklers in the press that it might be time to admit that a women-only prize was obsolete, and sixteen-years after its inception it may not be relevant to ‘give women writers a leg-up’.
However, its founder Kate Mosse announced that eighteen new potential sponsors have been queuing up for a chance to champion women’s fiction.
Kobo, the e-bookseller have expressed an interest, but, as revealed in the Sunday Telegraph, the most serious talks are with Apple (roll on the headlines announcing that ‘Oranges are Not the Only Fruit‘, which we will resist).
Whoever wins the bid, the award looks set to have an increased digital slant from 2013. The prize committee have also announced that their sights are set to develop the prize internationally.
Are you reading any brilliant fiction now that you’d put forward for the Orange (or Apple) Prize 2013?
Last year’s winner Song of Achilles is up there with the best books I’ve read this year, drippingly erotic in a lovely subtle way I read the whole thing in a night I was so gripped. It is ace.
Now I have to read it…
btw, if you’re in London Madeline Miller is speaking at Blackwells on Charing X Rd Sep. 4th at 6:30 (the event ids free but you have to book).