More acclaim for Mister Pip

Congratulations go to Lloyd Jones who has just won the The Kiriyama Prize for Literature.

The prize was established in 1996 to recognize outstanding books about the Pacific Rim and South Asia that encourage greater mutual understanding of and among its peoples and nations. Jones’ novel is set on the South Pacific island of Bougainville, during the island's bloody secessionist clash with Papua New Guinea in the 1990's.

As well as being chosen for Richard and Judy’s Best Read Award, Mister Pip also won the 2007 Commonwealth writers' prize and was a hotly-tipped shortlist contender for last year's Man Booker prize… but it was pipped at the post by Anne Enright’s The Gathering.

Richard and Judy's Book Club

Richard & Judy have announced the ten books that will appear on this year’s book club. Publishers can now look forward to ‘the Richard and Judy effect’ as they know that those authors who are included in this list will go on to become overnight bestsellers. Novels that have benefited in previous years include Audrey Niffenegger's The Time-Traveler's Wife and Kate Mosse's Labyrinth.

The books on this year's list are:

• A Thousand Splendid Suns by Khaled Hosseini
• Mister Pip by Lloyd Jones
• Then We Came to the End by Joshua Ferris
• Random Acts of Heroic Love by Danny Scheinmann
• The Rose of Sebastopol by Katherine McMahon
• A Quiet Belief in Angels by R J Ellroy
• Notes from an Exhibition by Patrick Gale
• The Visible World by Mark Slouka
• Blood River by Tim Butcher
• The Welsh Girl by Peter Ho Davies

Two of the books on this year’s list are already available as audio downloads: A Thousand Splendid Suns by Khaled Hosseini, author of The Kite Runner, also set in Afghanistan; and Lloyd Jones's Mister Pip, which was shortlisted for 2007's Man Booker prize, and won the Commonwealth Writers' book of the year award. We will be working hard over the next few weeks to bring the rest of this list to Audible.

The first episode of 2008's Book Club will be shown on 9th January. Viewers then vote for their favourite book and the winner earns the title of Richard and Judy's Best Read at the Galaxy British Book Awards in April.

To see a list of all the Richard & Judy books that are available to download from Audible go here.