Boyd, Moore and Morris longlisted for £10k Wilbur Smith Adventure Writing Prize

William Boyd, Susanna Moore and Priscilla Morris are among those longlisted for the £10,000 annual Wilbur Smith Adventure Writing Prize, Best Published Novel award. 

The prize is open to writers of any nationality, writing in English, and seeks to “support and celebrate adventure fiction in all its forms”. The longlist is chosen by a team of librarians and library staff from across the UK. 

This year’s longlist include Boyd’s The Romantic (Viking) alongside Moore’s The Lost Wife (Weidenfeld & Nicolson) and Morris’ Women’s Prize-shortlisted Black Butterflies (Duckworth). Laurie Lico Albanese’s Hester is also in the running for independent publisher Duckworth, alongside Rory Clements’ The English Führer (Bonnier Books UK) and Paddy Crewe’s My Name is Yip (Doubleday). 

Anthony McCarten’s Going Zero (Pan Macmillan) is on the list with Natasha Pulley’s The Half Life of Valery K (Raven Books) and Alastair Reynolds’ Eversion (Gollancz). Emma Styles’ No Country For Girls (Sphere), Alice Winn’s In Memoriam (Viking) and Jenny Tinghui Zhang’s Four Treasures of the Sky (Penguin Michael Joseph) complete the list. 

Niso Smith, founder of The Wilbur & Niso Smith Foundation, said: “Whether you seek it or it finds you, an adventure story must take you away from your everyday life. Each of these 12 authors do exactly that, for their protagonists and for us as readers. 

“These books take us to a 1990s Sarajevo under siege, on an overland trip through the unforgiving Australian landscape, to a top-secret research facility in a mysterious Soviet town, and challenge us to go off-grid for 30 days in a world even more technologically advanced than our own. We’re thrilled by the imagination and creativity these authors show, and salute each of them for their stellar, electrifying novels.” 

From the longlist, six titles selected by the same panel will progress to the shortlist, which will be revealed on 1st June. The titles will then be shared with 2023’s expert judging panel. This year’s judging panel comprises Felicity Aston MBE, British climate scientist, polar explorer, expedition leader and record-breaker; Giles Kristian, author and winner of the 2022 Wilbur Smith Adventure Writing Prize, Best Published Novel award; Leon McCarron, adventurer, filmmaker, writer and motivational speaker; and Simon Savidge, journalist, presenter, book reviewer and founder of blog and BookTube channel @SavidgeReads. The prize will also include a public vote over the summer with the reader’s choice equating to one seat on the judging panel. 

The overall winner will be announced on 18th October 2023 at a ceremony hosted at London’s Royal Geographical Society. The prize also includes award categories for unpublished and young writers.