Are you part of a book group?
We’re currently looking for volunteer readers to join us in judging this year’s SI Readers’ Choice Award, and we’d love your group to sign up.
What is the SI Readers’ Choice Award?
This award sits alongside the SI Leeds Literary Prize, which is open biennially to UK based Black or Asian women writers. It is entirely judged by volunteer readers, who choose their favourite from our shortlist of six manuscripts.
This additional award is extremely valuable to the shortlisted writers, giving them the chance to gather feedback from readers, rather than professional judges.
Get an author visit
We have a little something extra on offer for any book groups who are interested in judging the 2024 SI Readers’ Choice Award: our 2022 winner, Dr Laura Fish, will arrange an online visit with your group to discuss her prize-winning novel, Lying Perfectly Still, which will be published by Fly on the Wall Press in October.
This opportunity is open to a limited number of book groups, and will be offered in order of sign up.
If you’d like to take part, please email us at audience@sileedsliteraryprize.com by Friday 30 August 2024 to sign up.
About the book
A gripping story of exploitation and cultural collision…
Leaving Oxford and the shocking death of her father behind, Koliwe travels to AIDS-ravaged Eswatini to take a job as an aid worker. The Southern Africa she encounters is a far cry from her father’s stories.
As she becomes enmeshed with Thandi, a local girl hiding a disturbing past, Koliwe feels increasingly split between her English identity and her rediscovered African roots.
When Thandi goes missing, Koliwe’s search for truth leads her deep into the mountains, where the harsh realities of wealth, poverty, tradition and modernity, clash.
Harrowing yet richly evocative, Lying Perfectly Still provides an insider’s perspective on the horrors enabled by parts of the international aid community.
