|  Mark
Haddon has won the 2003 Whitbread Book of the Year Award
for his book The
Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-time.
The announcement was made yesterday evening at an awards
ceremony at The Whitbread Brewery in London.
Haddon beat off competition from first-time novelist DBC
Pierre for 'Vernon God Little', poet Don Paterson for 'Landing
Light', children’s author David Almond for The
Fire-Eaters, and celebrated biographer DJ Taylor for
his biography 'Orwell: The Life'.
Haddon has previously won both the Booktrust Teenage Fiction
Prize and the Guardian Children's Fiction Prize for his
book.
He aslo won the best book prize at the South Bank Show
awards given by the ITV1 arts series last week at a ceremony
hosted by the show's presenter Melvyn Bragg and held at
the Savoy Hotel in central London.
The book was initially entered for the Children’s
Book Award as well, but was withdrawn by the publishers
in preference to the Novel Award. (Whitbread Book Awards
rules stipulate that books may only be entered in one category.)
"It has been claimed of many recent books that they
could be read equally by adolescents or by adults. We felt
that this was a rare and genuine example of a book, which
would sit equally well on the shelves of any bedroom in
the house. "
Whitbread Judges
Philip Pullman became the first children's author to win
the prize in 2001 for his book The
Amber Spyglass.
Sir John Banham, Chairman of Whitbread PLC, presented the
author with his award and £25,000 cheque.
The
Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-time
is the sixth novel to win the Whitbread Book of the Year
since 1985.
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