Lucie Bryon and Manon Steffan Ros win the inaugural Entente Littéraire Prize

Lucie Bryon has won the inaugural £6,630 (€8,000) Entente Littéraire Prize for her YA graphic novel Thieves (Nobrow), alongside Manon Steffan Ros, who was awarded the prize for The Blue Book of Nebo, translated by Lise Garond (Firefly Press).

They were awarded the prize by HM The Queen and Mme Brigitte Macron, during an event celebrating the 120th anniversary of the Entente Cordiale.

Launched in 2023 during the King and Queen’s state visit to France, the prize aims to inspire "more young people to discover fiction from both sides of the Channel". It celebrates the "sharing of literary experiences between France and the UK" and is managed by the Institut Français du Royaume-Uni and the Royal Society of Literature (RSL). 

Meanwhile, Jo Ann Beard, Marlon James and Haruki Murakami are among the 12 authors that have been recognised in the fourth year of the RSL’s International Writers programme.

The RSL has also launched a new election process featuring an open call for public nominations for 2025 Fellows.

The International Writers programme aims to form "an ever-expanding global community of writers". It was announced as part of RSL 200, a five-year festival launched in 2020 with a series of new initiatives and appointments.

The work of those celebrated by the programme spans essays, literary fiction, plays, poems and non-fiction. Beard, James and Murakami are joined by Nuruddin Farah, Carolyn Forché and Georgi Gospodinov, as well as Witi Ihimaera, Suzan-Lori Parks and Judith Schalansky. Samanta Schweblin is also celebrated by the programme this year, alongside Kim Scott and Olive Senior.

Panel chair Kit Fan said: "With pain and passion—and soul-searching deliberation—we selected 12 writers whose works not only challenge the status quo of our limited time on earth, but reimagine a different kind of being where apart from fighting and idling, we find a common language for dream and solidarity."

The RSL has also called out to the general public to recommend writers to be appointed as fellows in summer 2025 via the RSL website. The new element of the election process will see the public recommend UK writers for consideration by a panel of fellows, led by former RSL vice-chair Irenosen Okojie.

As before, writers must have published or produced at least two substantial literary works or equivalent, which are of "outstanding literary merit", and must be resident in or citizens of the UK. The deadline for public submissions is 10th January.

A reading process between January and March will result in the panel’s shortlist of 40 ranked writers, which will be considered by the RSL’s governing council, vice-presidents, president and presidents emeriti. The top 30 voted-for writers will be elected fellows and will be inducted into the RSL Fellowship at the 2025 summer party.

Moreover, Karen McCarthy Woolf, clare e potter, Roseanne Watt and Scott McKendry have been announced as the winners of the £10,000 RSL Jerwood Poetry Awards.

The aim of the stipend is to give the poets time to write, and the winners will also receive mentoring and networking opportunities. 

"I am deeply honoured to receive the RSL Jerwood Poetry Award, which is a recognition that comes at quite a crucial point in my life," Watt said. "Following a challenging period of chronic illness (which I’m now, thankfully, getting the upper hand on), the award offers some much-needed encouragement and the means to reconnect with my craft with renewed vitality."

The winners will be partnered with a mentor from their country who have previously been mentored through the Jerwood Compton Poetry Fellowships. For Woolf, Anthony Joseph will act as a mentor, while potter will be supported by Owen Sheers. Jenni Fagan will mentor Watt, and McKendry’s mentor is Sinéad Morrissey.