Lovereading Latest: Book Awards

Please Don't Stop the Music - Jane Lovering

Please Don't Stop the Music
Jane Lovering

Format: Paperback - Released: 01/02/2011
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Winner of the RNA Romantic Novel of the Year Award 2012 and the RNA Romantic Comedy Novel Award 2012. Sarah Broadhurst's comment... '“My congratulations to Jane Lovering for winning the Romantic Novel of the Year with Please Don’t Stop the Music (Choc Lit), a fresh and compulsive page-turner with an interestingly different hero and lots of past drama interestingly drip-fed to us in a lovely read”. And from The judges as a whole: “It was a narrow choice between Please Don’t Stop the Music and The Kashmir Shawl by Rosie Thomas, but Jane’s voice was fresh and new with an unexpected hero. It was a romance with dark undertones and it engaged with issues a lot of people recognise. Good humour throughout.” The Lovereading view... This racy, good-fun book entices you into the main characters in the first few pages. Then it gallops through their relationship and the revelations of their troubled pasts at such a pace that you won't realise how quickly your own time has passed as you read this delightful book. On one level, easy and approachable, on another deep and meaningful, you will enjoy meeting these characters and you will want to know more about them. Well worth reading.

Never Coming Home - Evonne Wareham

Never Coming Home
Evonne Wareham

Format: Paperback - Released: 15/03/2012
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March 2012 Book of the Month. Winner of the 2012 Joan Hessayon New Writers' Scheme Award. A debut from an exciting new talent. A well written contemporary romantic thriller, set in London, Italy and the US, which will keep you guessing all the way through. The author has been a finalist twice in the American Title competition, run by RT Book Reviews Magazine and Dorchester Publishing of New York.

The Testament of Jessie Lamb - Jane Rogers

The Testament of Jessie Lamb
Jane Rogers

Format: Paperback - Released: 18/02/2011
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Winner of the Arthur C. Clarke Award 2012. Jessie Lamb is an ordinary girl living in extraordinary times: as her world collapses, her idealism and courage drive her towards the ultimate act of heroism. If the human race is to survive, it's up to her. Set just a month or two in the future, in a world irreparably altered by an act of biological terrorism, The Testament of Jessie Lamb explores a young woman's determination to make her life count for something, as the certainties of her childhood are ripped apart.

The Bees - Carol Ann Duffy

The Bees
Carol Ann Duffy

Format: Hardback - Released: 07/10/2011
Lovereading Price: £11.24 - Saving £3.75 (25%)

Winner of the Costa Poetry Award 2011. Shortlisted for the T S Eliot Prize for Poetry 2011. Shortlisted for the Galaxy UK Author of the Year Award 2011. Reviewed and selected by our poetry expert, Liam Parkin. Poet Laureate Carol Ann Duffy’s new collection is a diverse range of poetry in both technique and form. Her talent at capturing the essence of moments in time is on full show, and her explorations of war survivors, companions and historical figures are suitably surrounded by thematic investigations into the life of bees. The bees that pervade the anthology - both explicitly and implicitly – contain a variety of interesting and unique motifs; of nature, beauty and a profound awareness of our spiritual encounters in life. As is written, ‘Yes, I think a poem is a spell of kinds/ that keeps things living in a written line’ (Spell), and it is this sentiment that captures the tone of the collection. Duffy contains what is important within her lines, and it is a beautiful reminder of what life can, and should, be about. Click here to visit the Poetry Book Society page for Reading Groups and to download extracts from the T S Eliot Prize shortlist.

The Waste Land - Simon Acland

The Waste Land
Simon Acland

Format: Paperback - Released: 10/06/2010
Lovereading Price: £8.24 - Saving £2.75 (25%)

Shortlisted for the People's Book Prize for Fiction 2012. Set during the extraordinary historical events of the First Crusade this is an original and compelling debut full of mystery, betrayal, secrecy, romance, humour and suspense. Like Dan Brown’s adventures this one is also on the hunt for the Holy Grail and is also a cracking good story but unlike the Dan Brown this one provides an element of literary learning too. Clashes of good and evil as well as clashes of religion is commonplace as a group of desperate Oxford Dons retell the story of Hugh de Verdon, monk turned knight who sets out to uncover the truth behind the Holy Grail. September 2010 Debut of the Month. The second book in the series, The Flowers of Evil, can be viewed by clicking here. The Waste Land has been shortlisted for the People's Book Prize for Fiction 2012. Simon Acland's book, Angels, Dragons and Vultures has also been shortlisted for the People's Book Prize for Non-Fiction. Click here to find out more and to vote for your favourite.

Black Cat Bone - John Burnside

Black Cat Bone
John Burnside

Format: Paperback - Released: 04/08/2011
Lovereading Price: £7.50 - Saving £2.50 (25%)

Winner of the T S Eliot Prize for Poetry 2011. John Burnside's remarkable new book is full of strange, unnerving poems that hang in the memory like a myth or a song. These are poems of thwarted love and disappointment, of raw desire, of the stalking beast, 'eye-teeth/and muzzle/coated with blood'; poems that recognise 'we have too much to gain from the gods, and this is why/they fail to love us'; and, poems that tell of an obsessive lover coming to grief in a sequence that echoes the old murder ballads, or of a hunter losing himself in the woods while pursuing an unknown and possibly unknowable quarry. Drawing on sources as various as the paintings of Pieter Brueghel and the lyrics of Delta blues, Black Cat Bone examines varieties of love, faith, hope and illusion, to suggest an unusual possibility: that when the search for what we expected to find - in the forest or in our own hearts - ends in failure, we can now begin the hard and disciplined quest for what is actually there. Full of risk and wonder, Black Cat Bone shows the range of Burnside's abilities, but also strikes out for new territories. He remains consistently, though, one of our finest living lyric poets and each of these astonishing poems is as clear and memorable as 'a silver bracelet/falling for days/through an inch and a half/of ice'.

Higgy Matches, Microphones and MS - Alastair Hignell

Higgy Matches, Microphones and MS
Alastair Hignell

Format: Hardback - Released: 05/09/2011
Lovereading Price: £14.24 - Saving £4.75 (25%)

Winner of the Best Rugby Book at the British Sports Book Awards 2012. Alastair Hignell is renowned as a rugby international for England, a county cricketer and a much-loved broadcaster. Forced to retire from his playing careers at an early age due to injury, and then from his broadcasting career when his struggle with MS became too overwhelming, he has nonetheless lived life to the full. Higgy tells his inspirational story with warmth and humour - from growing up as a bright and very competitive young lad, on to his successful Cambridge university days where he was the first person to captain both the rugby and cricket first teams, through his playing careers against and alongside some of the all-time greats in both sports, and a prominent broadcasting career that took him around the world to cover some of the biggest sporting events and characters. All this success was brought into sharp relief by his diagnosis with MS, which eventually forced his retirement from broadcasting but also prompted him to become one of the leading campaigners for those suffering from the disease. Higgy's has been a tough journey, and his story is a fascinating example of strength and determination when faced with adversity. Appealing to a broad range of sports fans, this story is about setbacks and triumphs, about making the shift from the athletic struggles of sport to the struggle of performing everyday tasks. It's the genuine and emotional story of how a highly successful sportsman faced up to a devastating illness and became one of the most inspiring personalities of our age.

The 100 Greatest Ever Golfers - Andy Farrell

The 100 Greatest Ever Golfers
Andy Farrell

Format: Hardback - Released: 13/10/2011
Lovereading Price: £11.24 - Saving £3.75 (25%)

Winner of the Best Golf Book at the British Sports Book Awards 2012. What makes a great golfer? Is it innate talent, unstinting dedication, hard graft or inner strength? Can it be measured by championships won or prize money earned? Is the perfect technique more important than an engaging personality? Since the birth in 1860 of the Open Championship, every era of golf has produced its iconic great players, and here Andy Farrell selects his candidates for the top 100. From the early Scottish professionals who pioneered the game, such as Old Tom Morris and his son, Young Tommy, through such 20th century golden greats as Bobby Jones, Babe Zaharias, Arnold Palmer and Seve Ballesteros, to the modern era of Tiger Woods and Annika Sorenstam, and the young pretenders of Yani Tseng and Rory McIlroy.

A Life Too Short The Tragedy of Robert Enke - Ronald Reng

A Life Too Short The Tragedy of Robert Enke
Ronald Reng

Format: Hardback - Released: 29/09/2011
Lovereading Price: £12.74 - Saving £4.25 (25%)

Winner of the Best Football Book at the British Sports Book Awards 2012. Why does an international footballer with the World at his feet decide to take his own life? On 10 November 2009 the German national goalkeeper, Robert Enke, stepped in front of a passing train. He was thirty two years old. Viewed from the outside, Enke had it all. Here was a professional goalkeeper who had played for a string of Europe's top clubs including Jose Mourinho's Benfica and Louis Van Gaal's Barcelona. Enke was destined to be his country's first choice for years to come. But beneath the bright veneer of success lay a darker story. In A Life Too Short , award-winning writer Ronald Reng pieces together the puzzle of his lost friend's life. Reng brings into sharp relief the specific demands and fears faced by those who play top-level sport.

Fred Trueman The Authorised Biography - Chris Waters

Fred Trueman The Authorised Biography
Chris Waters

Format: Hardback - Released: 10/10/2011
Lovereading Price: £15.00 - Saving £5.00 (25%)

Winner of the Best Cricket Book at the British Sports Book Awards 2012. 'Fred Trueman was the first superstar of the game. He was a flamboyant, larger-than-life character' Ian Botham Fred Trueman was so much more than a cricketing legend. 'The greatest living Yorkshireman' according to Prime Minister Harold Wilson, he couldn't help excelling at everything he did, whether it was as a hostile fast bowler for Yorkshire and England, and the first man to take 300 Test wickets in a career, or as a fearlessly outspoken radio summariser for Test Match Special. He was famous for regularly spluttering that 'I don't know what's going off out there', as well as for the level of swearing he managed to incorporate into everyday speech. Beloved of cricket crowds who filled grounds to witness his belligerent way of playing the game, and nothing but trouble to the cricket authorities, 'Fiery Fred' was the epitome of a full-blooded Englishman. But as Chris Waters reveals in this first full biography, behind the charismatic, exuberant mask lay a far less self-assured man - terrified even that his new dog wouldn't like him - and whose version of his bucolic upbringing bore no relation to the gritty and impoverished South Yorkshire mining community where he actually grew up.

Engage The Fall and Rise of Matt Hampson - Paul Kimmage

Engage The Fall and Rise of Matt Hampson
Paul Kimmage

Format: Paperback - Released: 26/04/2012
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Winner of the Best Biography/Autobiography at the British Sports Book Awards 2012. 'Engage!' was the last word Matt Hampson heard before dislocating his neck while in rugby training with other young England hopefuls. On a cold, grey, overcast day in 2005, the cream of young English rugby gathered at a Northampton training ground. Matt Hampson, 'Hambo' to his mates, was one of them. He had dreamt of playing rugby for England ever since he had picked up a rugby ball at school. His skill, conviction and dedication had brought him to the cusp of realising that dream, in an England U21 team that included Olly Morgan, Toby Flood, Ben Foden and James Haskell. But as the two sets of forwards engaged for a scrum on the training field, the scrum collapsed and Matt, who played tight-head prop, took the full force of two opposing sides. In that moment his life changed forever. Paul Kimmage went to visit Matt as he recuperated, and wrote a piece for the Sunday Times which won him his third successive SJA sports interviewer of the year award. They struck up a friendship and here, Paul tells Matt's whole story, in all its intimate detail. From the build-up to the dreadful day, to Matt's recuperation, to his struggle to adjust to normal life again, to his family and friends, to other tragic incidents on the rugby field, to the response of the RFU, this is a story of terrible sadness yet unadorned triumph and joy, of anger yet of reconciliation and peace ...of a boy who became a man.