Weatherglass Books launches novella prize judged by Ali Smith

Independent press Weatherglass Books has launched a novella prize, judged by Ali Smith.  

Weatherglass Books was founded by Neil Griffiths, novelist and founder of the Republic of Consciousness Prize for Small Presses, and Damian Lanigan, a novelist and playwright. 

Lanigan said the press decided to launch a novella prize as “the novella is a form for our times”. He said: “Our attention spans are apparently getting shorter, and TV and films have trained us to expect narratives that evolve quite quickly and place the protagonists under a lot of pressure, so shorter fiction fits the pattern. But we think there’s maybe something a little more profound going on: the increasingly chaotic world is paradoxically too complex for a novel to take on. A novella — with its tight focus, with its need to come to an end all too soon, with its singular atmosphere – is the ideal form for glimpsing something essential about the world and ourselves." 

From over 150 submissions from all around the world, the team at Weatherglass Books chose five novellas to go to Smith. They include Astraea by Kate Kruimink, which Smith praised as “atmospheric, visceral, lyrical and frank”, and First, Do No Harm by Deborah Tomkins, which Smith called “deep-forged, witty and resonant”. 

The Guest by Leena Ronalds is also shortlisted which “examines human envies, needs and limitations”, alongside Mosaic by Amanda Schmidt, “a satisfyingly rhythmic read” and We Hexed the Moon by Mollyhall Seeley hailed as “a charmer” of a novella.  

Smith said: “The shortlist, in totality, was one of the most pleasurable and exciting things I’ve read in quite some time. The ways in which its writers dealt with the short-but-long/long-but-short constraints of the form; the problems and the opportunities that this gave them; and the remarkable standard of the writing from entry to entry made me wish that Weatherglass could publish the whole shortlist to remind the reading world that the novella form is a kind of marvel and show everyone that these writers have caught the shine and the life of it.” 

The winner(s) will be announced in August 2024 and published in September. Smith has agreed to repeat the process next year.