BBC National Short Story Award 2017 [BBC National Short Story Award]

Episodes

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if a book is locked there's probably a good reason for that, don't you think?20170920

Shortlisted for the BBC National Short Story Award 2017.

In Helen Oyeyemi's story office politics turn dark when a newcomer's handbag is upturned and secrets spill out. Read by Tamara Lawrance.

Helen Oyeyemi is the author of several highly acclaimed novels, including The Icarus Girl (2005); The Opposite House (2007); White is for Witching (2009), which won a Somerset Maugham Award and was a Shirley Jackson Award finalist; Mr Fox (2011) and Boy, Snow, Bird (2014), which was a finalist for the Los Angeles Times Book Prize. Her short story collection, What is not yours is not yours, was published in 2016 and won the PEN Open Book Award. Helen was selected as one of Granta's Best Young British Novelists in 2013. She studied social and political sciences at Corpus Christi, Cambridge.

The five stories in the BBC National Short Story Award 2017 reflected an energy and excitement about short fiction from a generation of the UK's most dynamic, contemporary writers.

Abridged and produced by Elizabeth Allard.

By Helen Oyeyemi. Office politics turn dark when a newcomer's handbag is upturned.

Stories shortlisted for the National Short Story Award

Murmur by Will Eaves20170921

Will Eaves's story is a vividly narrated account of a man finding himself on the wrong side of conventional morality.

Read by Blake Ritson.

Shortlisted for the BBC National Short Story Award 2017 - Will expanded it as a novel and won the Wellcome Prize Award 2019.

Will Eaves was the Arts Editor of the Times Literary Supplement from 1995 to 2011. He teaches in the Writing Programme at the University of Warwick. He is the author of four novels: The Oversight (2001; shortlisted for the Whitbread - now Costa - First Novel Award), Nothing To Be Afraid Of (2005; shortlisted for the Encore Award), This Is Paradise (2012), and The Absent Therapist (2014; shortlisted for the Goldsmiths Prize); and two collections of poetry: Sound Houses (2011) and The Inevitable Gift Shop (2016; shortlisted for the Ted Hughes Award for New Work in Poetry).

The five stories in the BBC National Short Story Award 2017 reflected an energy and excitement about short fiction from a generation of the UK's most dynamic, contemporary writers.

Abridged by Julian Wilkinson

Producer: Elizabeth Allard

First broadcast on BBC Radio 4 in September 2017.

Will Eaves\u2019s story about the price of transgression is shortlisted. Blake Ritson reads.

Stories shortlisted for the National Short Story Award

The Collector20170918Shortlisted for the BBC National Short Story Award 2017.

In Benjamin Markovits's story a lonely man is struggling to come to terms with recent events which are shrouded in mystery. Read by Kyle Soller.

Benjamin Markovits grew up in Texas, London, Oxford and Berlin. He has published seven novels, including Either Side of Winter, about a New York private school, and a trilogy on the life of Lord Byron: Imposture, A Quiet Adjustment and Childish Loves. His most recent novel, You Don't Have To Live Like This, about an experimental community in Detroit, won the James Tait Black Prize for Fiction in 2015. He won a Pushcart Prize for his short story Another Sad, Bizarre Chapter in Human History. Granta selected him as one of the Best of Young British Novelists in 2013.

The five stories in the BBC National Short Story Award 2017 reflected an energy and excitement about short fiction from a generation of the UK's most dynamic, contemporary writers.

Abridged by Rowan Routh

Produced by Elizabeth Allard.

By Benjamin Markovits. Story of a lonely man struggling with recent mysterious events.

Stories shortlisted for the National Short Story Award

The Edge of the Shoal20170919

The winning story from BBC National Short Story Award 2017.

Cynan Jones's story of survival on the seas is read by Jamie Parker.

Cynan Jones is the author of five novels, The Long Dry, Everything I Found on the Beach, The Dig, Bird, Blood, Snow and Cove. His work is widely translated, and short stories have appeared on BBC Radio 4 and in a number of anthologies and publications including Granta Magazine and The New Yorker. He also scripted an episode of the television crime drama Hinterland. He has won a Betty Trask Award, the Wales Book of the Year Fiction Prize, and a Jerwood Fiction Prize, and a chapter of The Dig was shortlisted for the Sunday Times EFG Private Bank Short Story Award in 2013. His novel Cove was longlisted for the Europese Literatuurprijs (in the Netherlands).

The five stories in the BBC National Short Story Award 2017 reflect an energy and excitement about short fiction from a generation of the UK's most dynamic, contemporary writers.

Abridged by Julian Wilkinson

Produced by Simon Richardson.

By Cynan Jones. The winning story of horror at sea. Can the protagonist survive? .

Stories shortlisted for the National Short Story Award

The Waken20170922Shortlisted for the BBC National Short Story Award 2017.

Jenni Fagan's story is set on a Scottish island where a young woman with vengeance on her mind has a transformative experience. Read by Joanna Vanderham.

Jenni Fagan has been nominated for the Pushcart Prize and was shortlisted for the Dundee International Book Prize, the Desmond Elliott Prize, and the James Tait Black Prize for her debut novel The Panoptican (2012). In 2013, she was selected as one of Granta's Best Young British Young Novelists and appointed as a writer-in-residence at the University of Edinburgh.

The five stories in the BBC National Short Story Award 2017 reflected an energy and excitement about short fiction from a generation of the UK's most dynamic, contemporary writers.

Produced by Elizabeth Allard.

By Jenni Fagan. Story of a young woman on a Scottish island with vengeance on her mind.

Stories shortlisted for the National Short Story Award