Stef Penney wins the Costa Book of the Year Award
Agoraphobic tells of her struggle to win book prize
Surprise win for Canadian epic at inaugural Costa award
Thrillers offer unexpected twist to shortlist plot in Costa book awards
Costa kicks off prize sponsorship with populist shortlist
Prestigious Costa award scooped by debut novel
British Library was used to research Canadian setting
A novel that had to be researched in the British Library because the writer was agoraphobic won one of Britain's most prestigious literary prizes last night.
Stef Penney picked up a £25,000 cheque after The Tenderness of Wolves won the Costa book of the year - formerly the Whitbread - prize, regarded as second only to the Man Booker award.
Armando Ianucci, chairman of the judges, said about two-thirds of the panel had voted for Penney's vivid account of life in a bleak landscape - northern Canada in the 1860s.
Last night, Penney, 37, described how she suffered as she wrote the novel. It took her more than two years to get on a London bus to travel to the British Library to research it. The freelance screenwriter is now over her condition - she now flies, for example - and said that if she had a message for agoraphobics it would be: "Don't give up. You might not know how you're going to get over it, but you can."
Penney said the landscape she wrote about may have been even more vivid because she had never been there.
The other two main contenders for the prize were William Boyd's spy tale, Restless, and Brian Thompson's memoir of his wartime childhood.
Ianucci said he fell in love with Penney's novel after about 50 pages. "We felt that this was not just an extraordinary first novel but also an extraordinary novel," said the writer and broadcaster. "It was a very ambitious undertaking."
He described the judging process, which took an hour and 10 minutes, as informal and "highly entertaining". He added: "For those who didn't have it as their first choice, it was their second choice."
The novel portrays the lives of natives and immigrants in northern Ontario in the 1860s. It is cold and harsh - and a murder changes everything.
Simon Robertson, fiction buyer at Waterstone's books, said sales had doubled since The Tenderness of Wolves won its "first novel" category last month. He said: "It's a very strong winner that will now achieve even greater sales in hardback, and will be a monster paperback."
At Foyle's, Kate Gunning, said: "It's a great win for a deserving book - an atmospheric murder mystery with broad commercial appeal."
The other two contenders were John Haynes for his book-length poem, Letters to Patience, and Linda Newbery for her children's book, Set in Stone.
The award was presented by Mariella Frostrup in front of a celebrity audience at the Grosvenor House Hotel in London.
Since the first book of the year prize in 1985, there have been seven wins by a novel, three by a first novel, five by a biography, five by poetry and only one children's book winner.
The Tenderness of Wolves was turned down by many publishers before the new publishing company Quercus picked it.
The only writer who had been at the prizes before was William Boyd, who won the "debut novel" award in the 1980s with A Good Man In Africa.
Boyd's gracefully written and enjoyable spy tale, Restless, which missed out on the main prize, is riding high in the bestsellers' lists, helped not only by the Costa awards but also by its inclusion in this year's Richard and Judy book club list.
Thompson's memoir, which was turned down by 10 publishers, is also selling well. It recalls his life as a boy and is full of nostalgic detail. His parents dominate: his father, who seemed to hate everyone, and his mother, who veered from a drab paranoid depressive to a glamorous temptress in Cuban heels and chiffon scarves.
guardian
