In North Yorkshire, floodwaters from Storm Henk hit fields and homes on the River Ouse on January 4. Reuters reported that the storm caused £150 million ($192.7 million) worth of damage to 2,000 homes. Image – Getty: Calling Curlew 23
By Porter Anderson, Editor in Chief | @Porter_Anderson
“And fear of climate change”
AThe UK’s James Cropper Wainwright Prize, announced today (15 August), focuses on the Earth and the natural world.
Here are the three categories:
- Nature writing
- Writing on the subject of nature conservation
- Children’s literature on nature and conservation
The Wainwright Society, in its 22nd year, has partners including the National Trust, which manages 250,000 hectares, 617,000 acres, of countryside and 775 miles of coastline in England, Wales and Northern Ireland. And there are the Wildlife Trusts. And there is the Royal Society for the Protection of Birds. And yet there is no category on the climate crisis.
The shortlists, which the programme has made available to media today, include first-time publications in the adult conservation and nature categories, four of six in the conservation field, as it turns out. The organisers write: “The books on the shortlist grapple with the realities of a world in crisis – from wildfires to global waste management to fears of climate change – and offer solutions to combat environmental degradation, as well as a rallying cry to find peace and connection in the small pieces of nature on our doorsteps.”
This week, when Britain recorded its highest temperatures of the year – and when 200 publishers signed the Publishers Association’s sustainability pledge, Publishing Declares – you might read this sentence Fear of climate change and politely point out that it is not only Fear.
At least, as you will notice, the second category includes John Vaillant’s Fire Weather: A True Story from a Hotter Worldwhich won the 2023 Baillie Gifford Prize for Nonfiction. In the US and Canada, the book will be published by Knopf, an imprint of Penguin Random House. Near Athens this week, firefighters reportedly finally put out a very real, new example of what Vaillant is trying to tell us, and “conservation” is probably no foreign word to them.
Shortlist for Nature Writing 2024
- Uprooting: From the Caribbean to the countryside – Finding a home in an English garden, Marchelle Farrell (Canongate)
- Bothy: Looking for simple accommodation, Kat Hill (HarperCollins / William Collins)
- Local: A search for nearby nature and wilderness, Alastair Humphreys (Eye Books)
- Spread: About plants, borders and belonging, Jessica J. Lee (Penguin Random House / Hamish Hamilton)
- The Garden Against Time: In Search of a Common Paradise, Olivia Laing (Pan Macmillan / Picador)
- Late Light: The Secret Wonders of a Vanishing World, Michael Malay, illustrated by Andy Lovell (Bonnier Books / Manilla Press)
- Rural: The life of the working class in the countryside, Rebecca Smith (HarperCollins / William Collins)
Shortlist for Writing on Conservation 2024
- Blue Machine: How the Ocean Shapes Our World, Helen Czerski (Penguin Random House / Transworld / Torva)
- Wasteland: The dirty truth about what we throw away, where it goes, and why it matters. Oliver Franklin-Wallis (Simon & Schuster)
- Groundbreaking events: The return of the British wild boar, Chantal Lyons (Bloomsbury Wildlife)
- You are not the only one: How to deal with eco-anxiety and the climate crisis, Tori Tsui (Simon & Schuster/Gallery Books)
- Fire Weather: A True Story from a Hotter World, John Vaillant (Hachette / Hodder & Stoughton / Scepter)
- The Spirits of Nature: The World We Lost and How to Bring It BackSophie Yeo (HarperCollins / HarperNorth)
Shortlist for children’s literature about nature 2024
- FoxlightKatya Balen (Bloomsbury Children’s)
- The ObservologistGiselle Clarkson (Lerner Publishing Group / Gecko Press)
- GenerallyEoin Colfer and Andrew Donkin, illustrated by Giovanni Rigano (Hachette / Hodder Children’s Books)
- SkrimsliNicola Davies, illustrated by Jackie Morris (Firefly Press)
- Flying: A children’s guide to birds and where to spot them, David Lindo, illustrated by Sara Boccaccini Meadows (Magic Cat Publishing)
- Geomancer: In the Shadow of the Wolf QueenKiran Millwood Hargrave (Hachette / Orion Children’s Books)
- Impossible creaturesKatherine Rundell (Bloomsbury Children’s)
- Wilding: How to bring back wild animals, Isabella Tree, illustrated by Angela Harding (Macmillan Children’s Books)
The winners will be announced on September 11 at Camley Street Nature Park near Kings Cross in London, “where a prize of £7,500 (US$9,644) will be shared,” organisers said today. It is not yet known with whom the money will be “shared”.
And for your information: This is a day (15 August) when Jonathan Watts was at The Guardian in England, wrote: “One of the most disturbing theories is that the Earth is losing its Albedothat is, the planet’s ability to radiate heat back into space. This is mainly because there is less white ice in the Arctic, Antarctic and on mountain glaciers. Peter Cox, a professor at the University of Exeter, noted on X that this “contributes enormously to the acceleration of global warming”. It would also suggest that the recent records are not just a strange combination of factors.”
Time for a fourth category?
You can find more information from Publishing Perspectives on international book and publishing awards here, more on the climate crisis here, more on nature writing here and more on the UK publishing market here.
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