The Bookseller.com

19th November 2008

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Hall wins John Llewellyn Rhys

30.11.07

Sarah Hall has won the 2007 John Llewellyn Rhys Prize for her novel The Carhullan Army. The award, which comes with a £5,000 prize, is presented by the UK's Booktrust and named for the late writer John Llewellyn Rhys, who was killed in action during World War II.

The Carhullan Army tells the story of an unrecognisable Britain where "much of the country [is] now underwater, assets and weapons seized by the government—itself run by the sinister Authority—and war raging in South America and China," according to the book's UK publisher Faber.

"Sarah Hall's fierce, uncomfortable story seemed to all judges to be the book that tackled the most urgent and alarming questions of today," said Suzi Feay, the chair of judges and literary editor of The Independent on Sunday. "The quality of The Carhullan Army was simply un-ignorable. We need writers with Hall's humanity and insight."

Hall beat out five other books on the shortlist: Blood Kin, by Ceridwen Dovey, Inglorious, by Joanna Kavenna, The Wild Places, by Robert Macfarlane, Joshua Spassky, by Gwendoline Riley, and Occupational Hazards, by Rory Stewart.

The judges for the John Llewellyn Rhys Prize this year were chair Feay, author Peter Hobbs and author and poet Michèle Roberts. Last year, Uzodinma Iweala won for Beasts of No Nation.

Prize John Llewellyn Rhys Prize Sarah Hall