The Bailey's Women's Prize For Fiction Marks 20 Years With A Series Of Events Starting This Monday

This Monday, 19th October, The Baileys Women's Prize for Fiction, the UK’s only book award for fiction written by a woman is collaborating with BBC Radio 4 'Woman’s Hour' as part of a series of events lined up to celebrate its 20th anniversary.

Each of the ten Chairs of Judges from 2006 – 2015 will be interviewed individually about ‘their’ winning novel. The interviews will be featured daily for two weeks. Listeners will be encouraged to vote for their favourite Women’s Prize for Fiction book of the second decade via a poll on the Woman’s Hour website.

The result will be announced on Monday 2nd November at London's Piccadilly Theatre in a 'Best of the Best Live' celebration hosted by novelist and Chair of the Board, Kate Mosse. Several award winning actors will be reading from each of the ten novels and there will also be a discussion with the ten Chairs of Judges (2006 - 2015) leading up to the announcement of the ‘Best of the Best’ novel of the past ten winners (2006 – 2015). For tickets to the event, click HERE.

As part of the celebrations, the Prize will be partnering with Waterstones who are supporting the anniversary activity with a dedicated promotion of the past ten winning novels in-store and online.

To further mark the occasion the Prize organisers have put together a souvenir free-to-download digital guide that includes features and comments from leading writers including Dame Jenni Murray DBE and Kate Mosse, plus reading notes for the Prize's winning books of the last 10 years with contributions from the winning titles. To download the guide, click HERE.

The winners of the past decade are:
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2006 – 'On Beauty' by Zadie Smith – Chair, Martha Kearney
2007 – 'Half of a Yellow Sun' by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie – Chair, Muriel Gray
2008 – 'The Road Home' by Rose Tremain – Chair, Kirsty Lang
2009 – 'Home' by Marilynne Robinson – Chair, Fi Glover
2010 – 'The Lacuna' by Barbara Kingsolver – Chair, Daisy Goodwin
2011 – 'The Tiger’s Wife' by Téa Obreht – Chair, Bettany Hughes
2012 – 'The Song of Achilles' by Madeline Miller – Chair, Joanna Trollope OBE
2013 – 'May We Be Forgiven' by A. M Homes – Chair, Miranda Richardson
2014 – 'A Girl is a Half-formed Thing' by Eimear McBride – Chair, Helen Fraser
2015 – 'How to be Both' by Ali Smith – Chair, Shami Chakrabarti CBE