Costa Book Awards: 2019 Shortlists Announced

The shortlists for the Costa Book Awards were announced on Tuesday!

The awards celebrate the most enjoyable books of the year by writers from the UK and Ireland, with past winners including Sally Rooney, Gail Honeyman and Sebastian Barry.

There are five shortlists in total – one each for First Novel, Novel, Biography, Poetry and Children’s Book – and one book is selected from the winner of each category as the overall Book of the Year. The category winners will be announced on Monday 6 January, 2020, and the overall winner will be revealed on Tuesday 28 January.

Read on to see all of the shortlisted books for the 2019 Costa Book Award!

Costa Novel Award shortlist

• Middle England by Jonathan Coe
• Confession with Blue Horses by Sophie Hardach
• Starling Days by Rowan Hisayo Buchanan
• Shadowplay by Joseph O’Connor

Costa First Novel Award shortlist

• Diary of a Somebody by Brian Bilston
• Queenie by Candice Carty-Williams
• The Confessions of Frannie Langton by Sara Collins
• The Other Half of Augusta Hope by Joanna Glen

Costa Biography Award shortlist

• On Chapel Sands by Laura Cumming
• The Volunteer by Jack Fairweather
• In Extremis: The Life of War Correspondent Marie Colvin by Lindsey Hilsum
• The Making of Poetry: Coleridge, the Wordsworths and Their Year of Marvels by Adam Nicolson

Costa Poetry Award shortlist

• Surge by Jay Bernard
• Flèche by Mary Jean Chan
• The Mizzy by Paul Farley
• Reckless Paper Birds by John McCullough

Costa Children’s Book Award shortlist

• Asha & the Spirit Bird by Jasbinder Bilan
• Crossfire by Malorie Blackman
• In the Shadow of Heroes by Nicholas Bowling
• Furious Thing by Jenny Downham

Congratulations to all of the shortlisted authors!

You can find more information here

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Olivia Fricot

Olivia Fricot (she/her) is Booktopia's Senior Content Producer and editor of the Booktopian blog. She has too many plants and not enough bookshelves, and you can usually find her reading, baking, or talking to said plants. She is pro-Oxford comma.

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