The Bookseller.com

17th May 2008

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£10,000 book prize launches

06.05.08 Jo Young

The Bristol Festival of Ideas has launched a new £10,000 annual book prize, the first of which will be presented in May 2009, the fifth anniversary of the festival's founding.

The award, which is sponsored by Blackwell and the organisation Arts & Business, will be presented at the festival each year to the title chosen as the best "book of ideas".

The winning book will be one that is deemed to "present new, important and challenging ideas, which is rigorously argued, and which is engaging and accessible". It will be chosen by a panel of judges including philosopher Julian Baggini, the m.d. of IOP Publishing Jerry Cowhig and Sara Davies, the executive producer of BBC Radio 4. The recipient of the £10,000 prize will be announced in March and the award presented in May next year.

This year's Bristol Festival of Ideas will run throughout May, featuring speakers such as author and campaigner Naomi Klein, influential legal writer Phillippe Sands and journalist Jon Ronson.

Authors Prize Jo Young