Entertainment/Women's Prize for Fiction

From Quiz Revision Notes


The Women's Prize for Fiction is awarded annually to a female author of any nationality for the best original full-length novel written in English, and published in the United Kingdom in the preceding year.

The winner of the prize receives £30,000, along with a bronze sculpture called the Bessie created by artist Grizel Niven.

Previous names of the award –

·        Orange Prize for Fiction (1996 – 2006 and 2009 – 2012)

·        Orange Broadband Prize for Fiction (2007 – 2008)

·        Bailey’s Women’s Prize for Fiction (2014 – 2017)

Barbara Kingsolver is the only woman to have won the award twice.

Margaret Atwood has been nominated three times without a win. Hilary Mantel was shortlisted three times without winning.

In 2005, judges named Andrea Levy's Small Island as the "Orange of Oranges", the best novel of the preceding decade.

1996 Helen Dunmore A Spell of Winter
1997 Anne Michaels Fugitive Pieces
1998 Carol Shields Larry’s Party
1999 Suzanne Berne A Crime in the Neighborhood
2000 Linda Grant When I Lived in Modern Times
2001 Kate Grenville The Idea of Perfection
2002 Ann Patchett Bel Canto
2003 Valerie Martin Property
2004 Andrea Levy Small Island
2005 Lionel Shriver We Need to Talk About Kevin
2006 Zadie Smith On Beauty
2007 Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie Half of a Yellow Sun
2008 Rose Tremain The Road Home
2009 Marilynne Robinson Home
2010 Barbara Kingsolver The Lacuna
2011 Téa Obreht The Tiger’s Wife
2012 Madeline Miller The Song of Achilles
2013 A. M. Homes May We Be Forgiven
2014 Eimear McBride A Girl Is a Half-formed Thing
2015 Ali Smith How to be Both
2016 Lisa McInerney The Glorious Heresies
2017 Naomi Alderman The Power
2018 Kamila Shamsie Home Fire
2019 Tayari Jones An American Marriage
2020 Maggie O’Farrell Hamnet
2021 Susanna Clarke Piranesi
2022 Ruth Ozeki The Book of Form and Emptiness
2023 Barbara Kingsolver Demon Copperhead