Mary Costello shortlisted for top prize as first novel is published

Mary Costello has double cause to celebrate today as on the same day that her debut novel, Academy Street, is published by Canongate, it has just been shortlisted for the Eason Novel of the Year award, the pre-eminent category in the Bord Gáis Energy Irish Book Awards 2014.

Costello, whose short story collection The China Factory was first published by Stinging Fly in 2012 and positively reviewed in The Irish Times, faces stiff competition from five more well-established authors, Colm Tóibín (Nora Webster), Joseph O'Connor (The Thrill of it All), David Mitchell (The Bone Clocks), John Kelly (From Out of the City) and John Boyne (A History of Loneliness), the current Irish Times Book Club selection.

Academy Street is the story of Tess, who grows up in the west of Ireland in the 1940s as a shy introverted child, but whose heart of fire drive her to make her home and find love and loss on Academy Street among the hurly burly of 1960s New York. It has also been chosen for the Book of Bedtime slot on BBC Radio 4, a status it shares with Nora Webster, The Thrill of it All and The Bone Clocks.

Audrey Magee, whose debut novel, The Undertaking, was shortlisted for The Bailey's Women's Prize for Fiction (formerly the Orange Prize), has also been shorrlisted for the newcomer of the year category, along with Darragh McKeon, Eoin Macken, Oona Frawley, Louise O'Neill and Rob Doyle.

The Irish Times has two entries on the six-strong shortlist for the Writing.ie Short Story of the Year prize: Eveline by Donal Ryan and Rest Day by John Boyne.

The winners will be announced at the awards dinner on Wednesday, November 26th in The DoubleTree by Hilton Hotel in Ballsbridge, Dublin, with highlights broadcast on RTÉ1.

The full shortlists for the 12 categories in the Bord Gáis Energy Irish Book Awards 2014 are:

Eason Novel of the Year:

Nora Webster by Colm Tóibín (Viking)

The Thrill of it All by Joseph O’Connor (Harvill Secker)

The Bone Clocks by David Mitchell (Hodder)

A History of Loneliness by John Boyne (Doubleday)

From Out of the City by John Kelly (Dalkey Archive Press)

Academy St by Mary Costello (Canongate)

Sunday Independent Newcomer of the Year:

All that is Solid Melts into Air by Darragh McKeon (Viking)

Kingdom of Scars by Eoin Macken (Poolbeg Press)

Flight by Oona Frawley (Tramp Press)

Only Ever Yours by Louise O’Neill (Quercus)

Here are the Young Men by Rob Doyle (The Lilliput Press)

The Undertaking by Audrey Magee (Atlantic Books)

National Book Tokens Non-Fiction Book of the Year:

Get Sh*t Done! by Niall Harbison (Penguin Ireland)

The Last Armada by Des Ekin (The O’Brien Press)

The Life and Loves of a He Devil by Graham Norton (Hodder & Stoughton)

It’s Not Yet Dark by Simon Fitzmaurice (Hachette Books Ireland)

Hanging with The Elephant by Michael Harding (Hachette Books Ireland)

Tom Gilmartin by Frank Connolly (Gill & Macmillan)

Bord Gáis Energy Sports Book of the Year:

The Test by Brian O’Driscoll (Penguin Ireland)

The Second Half by Roy Keane with Roddy Doyle (Orion)

Dalo: The Autobiography of Anthony Daly by Anthony Daly (Transworld Ireland)

The Race to Truth by Emma O’Reilly (Bantam)

A Different Shade of Green by Alan McLoughlin (Ballpoint Press)

Fields of Fire by Damian Lawlor (Transworld Ireland)

TheJournal.ie Best Irish-Published Book of the Year

The Long Acre by PJ Cunningham (Ballpoint Press)

Judging WT Cosgrave by Michael Laffan (Royal Irish Academy)

Dubliners 100: by Thomas Morris (Tramp Press)

Dancehall Days by Michael O’Reilly (Gill & MacMillan)

The Glorious Madness, Tales of the Irish in World War I by Turtle Bunbury (Gill & MacMillan)

TK Whitaker: Portrait of the Patriot by Anne Chambers (Doubleday Ireland)

Specsavers Children’s Book of the Year: (Junior)

TiN by Chris Judge(Andersen Press)

Brian and the Vikings by Chris Judge and Mark Wickham (The O’Brien Press)

Shh! We Have a Plan by Chris Haughton (Walker Books)

Specs for Rex by Yasmeen Ismail (Bloomsbury Children’s)

Specsavers Children’s Book of the Year: (Senior)

Skulduggery Pleasant, The Dying Light by Derek Landy (Harper Collins Children’s Books)

Apple and Rain by Sarah Crossan (Bloomsbury Children's)

Moone Boy by Chris O’Dowd and Nick Vincent Murphy (Macmillan Children’s Books)

Brilliant by Roddy Doyle (Macmillan Children’s Books)

Avonmore Cookbook of the Year:

The Happy Pear by David and Stephen Flynn (Penguin Ireland)

All Things Sweet by Rachel Allen (Harper Collins)

The Nation’s Favourite Food Fast by Neven Maguire (Gill &Macmillan)

From Lynda’s Table by Lynda Booth (DCS Publishing)

Back To Basics by Kevin Dundon (Hachette Books Ireland)

The Extra Virgin Kitchen by Susan Jane White (Gill and Macmillan)

Ireland AM Crime Fiction Book of the Year:

Unravelling Oliver by Liz Nugent (Penguin Ireland)

The Kill by Jane Casey (Ebury Publishing)

The Final Silence by Stuart Neville (Harvill Secker)

Can Anybody Help Me? by Sinead Crowley (Quercus)

The Secret Place by Tana French (Hachette Books Ireland)

Last Kiss by Louise Phillips (Hachette Books Ireland)

Popular Fiction Book of the Year:

Keeping Up with the Kalashnikovs by Ross O’Carroll Kelly (Penguin Ireland)

The Secrets Sisters Keep by Sinéad Moriarty (Penguin Ireland)

The Year I Met You by Cecelia Ahern (HarperCollins)

The Last Days of Rabbit Hayes by Anna McPartlin (Transworld Ireland)

It Started With Paris by Cathy Kelly (Orion)

The Heart of Winter by Emma Hannigan (Hachette Books Ireland)

RTE Radio One John Murray Show Listeners’ Choice:

Us by David Nicholls (Hodder & Stoughton)

Unravelling Oliver by Liz Nugent (Penguin Ireland)

The Life and Loves of a He-Devil by Graham Norton (Hodder and Stoughton)

It’s All in the Head by Majella O’Donnell (Simon &Schuster)

The Test by Brian O’Driscoll (Penguin Ireland)

Paul Galvin: The Autobiography by Paul Galvin (Transworld Ireland)

Writing.ie Short Story of the Year:

Eveline by Donal Ryan (The Irish Times)

Paprika by Frank McGuinness (Surge, The O’Brien Press)

Absence by Christine Dwyer Hickey (New Island Books)

Rest Day by John Boyne (The Irish Times)

Priesteen by Ciarán Folan (The London Magazine)

Five Days to Polling Day by Danielle McLaughlin (The South Circular)

[ bgeirishbookawards.ie ]