Joseph and Garmus shortlisted for RSL Christopher Bland Prize

Bonnie Garmus and Paterson Joseph are among those shortlisted for the £10,000 RSL Christopher Bland Prize for a debut novelist or non-fiction writer aged 50 or over.  

Garmus is shortlisted for Lessons in Chemistry (Doubleday) alongside Joseph’s The Secret Diaries of Ignatius Sancho (Dialogue Books). Susie Alegre’s Freedom to Think (Atlantic Books), Jo Browning Wroe’s A Terrible Kindness (Faber & Faber), Jill Nalder’s Love from the Pink Palace (Wildfire) and Devika Ponnambalam’s I Am Not Your Eve (Bluemoose Books) are also in contention.  

Chair of judges Lemn Sissay said: “The RSL Christopher Bland Prize for debut authors over 50 means they are the bridge between the digital age and the analogue world. This is evident in Susie Alegre’s brilliant and timely Freedom to Think. It is a vital handbook of the history of human rights by a barrister, yet written in language which people like me can understand.” 

He also praised Joseph’s work as “bursting with wit” adding “Paterson Joseph, an actor by trade, is clearly a writer in an actor’s body. Many thespians feel the urge to inhabit the world of a writer, but few can fulfil it to the degree of Paterson Joseph.” 

Fellow judge Simon Savidge commented: “With A Terrible Kindness, Jo Browning Wroe creates a fascinating character study of how we become the people we are, not just by the big moments of history we encounter, but also the smaller moments in our personal histories that change us forever. With the assurance of a writer who could be on their fifth or sixth book, she exposes the foibles of human nature, death and grief, how our childhoods can haunt us and how we should live for those who leave us behind.”

He also lauded Nalder’s Love from the Pink Palace as “one of the most heart brimming and heartbreaking books that I have read in some time”. 

Judge Meena Kandasamy said she “loved" Lessons in Chemistry which she described as “such a refreshing read, written with joviality and verve" also praising Ponnambalam’s novel as “a thing of beauty”.  

The winner will be announced on Thursday 8th June.