Now in its fourth year, The Diverse Book Awards, officially opens on 12th January 2023 for nominations from UK and Ireland based publishers and authors, for diverse and inclusive books published any time during 2022. And a new category – Picture Books – has been added to complement Children’s, YA and Adult.
The 2023 awards process officially begins on Thursday 12th January 2022, hot on the heels of the incredible success of last year’s Diverse Book Awards, which saw Benjamin Dean’s Me, My Dad and the End of the Rainbow, illustrated by Sandhya Prabhat (Simon & Schuster Children’s UK) win best Children’s Book, Natasha Bowen’s Skin of the Sea (Penguin Random House Children’s) win best YA Book, and Kia Abdullah’s Next of Kin (HQ) win best Adult’s Book.
The awards are free to enter until 31st May 2023, and are open to books regardless of their route to publication; therefore self-published authors are invited to nominate their own books, and indie, collaborative, hybrid and traditional publishers are all welcome at the table!
To submit your book for nomination visit: https://www.thediversebookawards.co.uk/entertheawards
The longlist will be announced in July 2023, the shortlist in September 2023 and the winners in October 2023.
Fans of diverse books are welcome to join Chloe Seager, literary agent at the Madeleine Milburn Agency in conversation with the 2022 winners – Benjamin Dean, Natasha Bowen and Kia Abdullah – at a free, online event on 25th January. For more information and to RSVP: https://DBAWinnersPanel2022.eventbrite.co.uk
Last year, the winners were announced at a party in Waterstones Piccadilly, celebrating the three winners selected out of more than 100 submissions. This year, the co-founders, bestselling, award-winning children’s/YA author Abiola Bello and prize-winning publicist Helen Lewis, are hoping to receive a wide range of nominations from indie authors through to traditional publishers.
Helen Lewis and Abiola Bello, co-founders of The Author School and The Diverse Book Awards, say: “In 2022, we finally got the chance to celebrate The Diverse Book Awards in person and online with a winners party in London and an online event shortly afterwards with the three prize-winning authors. Now in our fourth year, we are so proud of how the awards have grown, and look forward to discovering new authors, reading brilliant books, and championing the brilliant diverse and inclusive stories published in the UK and Ireland. Being recognised in initiatives such as The Diverse Book Awards can have a hugely positive impact on the sales of a book, the profile of an author and build a buzz around a publisher. If you’re a UK or Ireland based author/publisher and released a brilliant diverse and inclusive book in 2022… what are you waiting for?”
