PRH and Pan Mac lead British Book Awards trade shortlists

Penguin Random House and Pan Macmillan lead the pack among the shortlists for the trade categories of the British Book Awards 2020. Penguin Random House has 17 nominations and Pan Macmillan has 12.

Four PRH divisions will be among the contenders battling it out to become Publisher of the Year (sponsored by Bertram Books), with Michael Joseph, Vintage, Ebury and last year's winner Penguin General all shortlisted for the accolade. But they will face strong competition from HarperCollins, Pan Macmillan, Hachette's Hodder & Stoughton and Faber, previously a two-time winner of Independent Publisher of the Year and now taking its place among the corporates for the first time.

Meanwhile in the lead retail category Book Retailer of the Year (sponsored by Simon & Schuster), reigning winner W H Smith Travel returns to defend its crown against stablemate W H Smith High Street, as well as Blackwell's, Tesco and Waterstones.

Elsewhere in the publishing categories, Imprint of the Year (sponsored by Clays) will see two Pan Macmillan imprints—Pinch of Nom publisher Bluebird and last year's award-winner Picador—vying with HarperCollins' Avon, Egmont's Electric Monkey, Hachette's Piatkus and Bonnier Books UK's Zaffre. Three PRH imprints will also be in contention: Chatto & Windus, publisher of Margaret Atwood's The Testaments; Hamish Hamilton, publisher of joint Booker-winner Bernardine Evaristo; and children's imprint Ladybird.

A raft of new faces feature on the shortlist for Editor of the Year, with only three of the shortlisted candidates making a repeat appearance. Emad Akhtar of Orion joins Mrs Hinch editor Fenella Bates of Michael Joseph, Pan Macmillan's Ingrid Connell, Beckie Hardie of Chatto & Windus, Alexis Kirschbaum of Bloomsbury and HQ's Kate Mills. Also shortlisted are Bluebird's Carole Tonkinson, the 2018 award-winner Simon Prosser of Hamish Hamilton, and Hodder's Nick Sayers.

Clare Alexander of Aitken Alexander Associates and Sarah Ballard of United Agents are among the contenders for Literary Agent of the Year (sponsored by Amazon Publishing); also shortlisted in the category is Abigail Bergstrom of Gleam Titles, Jenny Brown of Edinburgh-based Jenny Brown Associates, RCW's Sam Copeland, Clare Hulton of Clare Hulton Literary Agency, 2018's winner Madeleine Milburn of the Madeleine Milburn Literary, TV & Film Agency and Karolina Sutton of Curtis Brown.

The Rights Professional of the Year shortlist is an all-woman line-up: Rebecca Folland of Hodder & Stoughton, John Murray Press, Quercus and Headline faces Orion's Krystyna Kujawinska, Michela Pea of Nosy Crow, the Penguin Random House Children's Rights Team entering en masse, and Stephanie Purcell of Simon & Schuster, who is shortlisted for the third year in a row. Also in contention is Eve Roberts of Macmillan Children's Books and Anna Shora of Pan Macmillan. Liane-Louise Smith from the Madeline Milburn Literary, TV and Film Agency is the sole literary agency pro on the shortlist.

Showcasing the skills of the indie sector for Independent Publisher of the Year (sponsored by The Firsty Group) are Atlantic Books, fast-growing Joffe Books, Scribe UK, arts and crafts publisher Search Press and Christian publisher SPCK. There are also three childrens publishers on the shortlist: Suffolk-based Imagine That; Nosy Crow, scoring its seventh shortlisting in a row; and Leicester indie Sweet Cherry.

Meanwhile the shortlist for the Academic, Educational and Professional Publisher of the Year (sponsored by Westchester) sees last year's winner Emerald take on Bloomsbury Academic, Cambridge University Press, Collins, Hachette-owned Jessica Kingsley Publishers and Kogan Page, the latter appearing on the shortlist for the third year in a row.

Nine creative strategies will battle it out for Marketing Strategy of the Year (sponsored by Nielsen): Bookouture is nominated for its work on First Blood by Angela Marsons; HarperCollins is in contention for Bridget Collins' The Binding; Pan Macmillan gets nominations both for the campaign for Elton John's Me and for the marketing behind Kate Allinson and Kay Featherstone's Pinch of Nom; PRH makes the shortlist for its Penguin Classics in Audio programme and for the high-profile marketing of Margaret Atwood's The Testaments; and Quercus is nominated for turning Beth O'Leary's The Flatshare into one of the year's most noticed debuts. Meanwhile Scottish BookTrust is shortlisted for Book Week Scotland 2019 and Usborne for its successful "Happy Birthday That's Not My..." campaign.

Six campaigns which have already been recognised at the Publishers' Publicity Circle's annual awards go up against each other for Publicity Campaign of the Year. Lucy Cuthbertson-Twiggs of Chatto & Windus is shortlisted for her work on Invisible Women by Caroline Criado Perez; Fran Owen, Mari Yamazaki and Alison Davies of Chatto & Windus are nominated for the campaign for Margaret Atwood's The Testaments; Jessica Duffy of Pan Mac's Bluebird makes the list for her work on Tin Can Cook by Jack Monroe; Maura Wilding and Leanne Oliver of Hachette UK's Trapeze are nominated for the campaign for Queenie by Candice Carty-Williams; Katherine Macpherson of Bloomsbury goes up for her campaign for Period Power by Maisie Hill; and Katarina Jovanovic of Usborne and freelance publicist Liz Scott are nominated for their work on The Places I've Cried in Public by Holly Bourne.

Children's Publisher of the Year (sponsored by Pan Macmillan) will be contested by a broad spectrum of shortlistees: DK, HarperCollins Children's Books, Macmillan Children's Books, 2019 winner Nosy Crow, Penguin Random House Children's, Scholastic, Usborne and new kid on the block Wonderbly. Meanwhile up for Children's Bookseller of the Year are chain retailer Blackwell's; the Blessington Book Store in County Wicklow, Ireland; 2014 winner the Edinburgh Bookshop; Griffin Books in Penarth, near Cardiff; the Little Ripon Bookshop in Yorkshire; London's Moon Lane; Sevenoaks Bookshop in Kent; and last year's winner Waterstones.

Returning for a second year in 2020, the British Book Award for Export (sponsored by Pansing Distribution/Times Publishing) will be contested between Bonnier Books UK, Jolly Learning and Nosy Crow in the companies with export revenue under £10m category; while DK, Egmont and Pan Macmillan face off in the over £10m firms.

As previously announced, the Independent Bookshop of the Year Award (sponsored by Gardners) will be contested by the regional and country winners: Book-ish in Crickhowell, BrOOK'S in Pinner, Button & Bear Children's Bookshop in Shrewsbury, Forum Books in Corbridge, Hunting Raven Books in Frome, Philip's in Mallow in County Cork, the Book Hive in Norwich, the Book Shop in Lee-on-the-Solent and Edinburgh's Lighthouse Books.

The Small Press of the Year (sponsored by CPI Group) accolade will be awarded on the night to one of the nine regional and country winners already unveiled: Comma Press, Firefly Press, Jacaranda, the Lilliput Press, Otter-Barry Books, Really Decent Books, Sandstone Press, September Publishing and Tiny Owl.

The awards will take place on 29th June 2020 at The J W Marriott Grosvenor House Hotel, London.