What are the Nero Book Awards?
A new set of multi-category book awards celebrating the craft of great writing and the joy of reading for writers based in the UK and Ireland.
What is the purpose of the Nero Book Awards?
To help readers of all tastes to discover and enjoy outstanding books through recommendation. The Nero Book Awards will do this by providing readers with a recognisable mark of outstanding quality and readability.
What do the Nero Book Awards hope to achieve?
They aim to become the recognised badge for quality writing and recommended reads by writers living in the UK and Ireland.
Which books are eligible for the Nero Book Awards?
Books first published in English in the UK or Ireland between the 1st of December and 30th of November each year. At the time of entry, authors must be alive and resident in the UK or Ireland for the past three years.
What are the categories?
There are four categories: Children’s Fiction, Debut Fiction, Fiction and Non-Fiction.
How are the Nero Book Awards judged?
Publishers are asked to submit books across the four Awards categories in June and July, ahead of a reading process that runs over the summer and autumn. Shortlists and winners from each category will then be selected by judges from across the world of books, whose mission is simply to choose which reads from the past 12 months they would most want to recommend to others. Of the four category winners, one book will be selected as an overall winner, The Nero Gold Prize.
What is the prize fund?
The total prize fund is £50,000. The authors of the winning books in the four categories each receive £5,000. The author of the winning “Book of the Year” receives a further £30,000.
What are the key announcement dates?
The announcement of the first category shortlists (16 books, four per category) took place on 21st November 2023. The four Category winners will be announced on 30th January 2024 and, of those, one book will be selected as the “Book of the Year” – The Nero Gold Prize. Further details will be announced in due course via nerobookawards.com.
How are the Awards run?
The Awards are run as a not-for-profit organisation. The day-to-day running of the Awards is handled by the Management Team, headed up by Awards Director Amanda Johnson, formerly publicity and project director of the Women’s Prize for Fiction and, most recently, Director of the Costa Book Awards. The Awards are administered by The Booksellers Association, the trade body founded to promote retail bookselling in the United Kingdom and Ireland, led by Alan Staton. All Awards communications and events are handled by Riot Communications, an award-winning PR agency that specialises in arts, culture and entertainment, led by Katy MacMillan-Scott.
Who are the Nero Book Awards partners?
The Nero Book Awards are run and underwritten by Caffè Nero and have been developed in partnership with The Booksellers Association who will administer the Awards. The Awards are in association with Brunel University London and Right To Dream, both of whom are providing funding support. Further details on partnership activity will be announced in due course.
Is this Caffè Nero’s first arts partnership?
No, Caffè Nero has a rich history of supporting the arts which began when the brand was founded in 1997. The Nero Book Awards is a natural extension of that. Over the years Caffè Nero has supported arts institutions such as Tate Modern, Tate Britain, National Portrait Gallery, British Museum, The National Gallery, V&A and the Royal Academy of Arts. They have sponsored design awards at Central St Martins, and, in Poland, Caffè Nero supports the annual Warsaw Photography Awards. Caffè Nero has also discovered, championed, and promoted music artists through its long-standing, dedicated music programme, including famous artists such as Jack Savoretti.