Delaney scoops Authors’ Club Best First Novel Award

Début author Tish Delaney has been awarded The Authors’ Club’s Best First Novel Award for Before My Actual Heart Breaks (Hutchinson Heinemann).

The book was chosen by guest adjudicator Alex Weatle from a shortlist drawn up by a panel of Authors’ Club members chaired by Lucy Popescu. Wheatle, who presented the £2,500 award to Delaney at a reception at the National Liberal Club in London on 25th May, said: “The reader has to endure an emotional rollercoaster with Mary Rattigan as we follow her life as a young girl, woman and mother. I think I wept at least three times as Mary made her choices and described her life. It’s an extraordinary début.” 

Popescu described the book as “a stunning evocation of a woman emotionally stunted by an abusive childhood and her affecting rites of passage”. 

The prize is for the début novel from a British, Irish or UK-based author of any age first published in the UK. Delaney won from a shortlist of Yvonne Bailey-Smith’s The Day I Fell Off My Island (Myriad Editions), A K Blakemore’s The Manningtree Witches (Granta), Lucy Jago’s A Net for Small Fishes (Bloomsbury) and Melody Razak’s Moth (W&N). 

She said: "I can’t really express how surprised I am to win. When Alex Wheatle called my name, I had to check with my editor, Charlotte Cray, to make sure it was true. It’s wonderful to be recognised by one’s peers. Alex talked about what a difficult time he’s had choosing and, having read the amazing competition, I didn’t envy him his task. The award means so much to me and I hope to work even harder to live up to the honour.”

The Authors’ Club Best First Novel Award was inaugurated in 1954. Last year’s prize was awarded to Ingrid Persaud.