Jane Harris (born 1961) is a British writer of fiction and screenplays. Her novels have been published in over 20 territories worldwide and translated into many different languages (see The Observations and Gillespie and I). Her most recent work is the novel Sugar Money which has been shortlisted for several literary prizes. [1] [2] [3]
Harris was nominated for the British Book Awards Newcomer of the Year (2007) and the Southbank Show/Times Breakthrough Award (2007), and was chosen as a Waterstones Author of the Future, also in 2007. [4]
![]() | This section of a biography of a living person does not include any references or sources .(June 2023) |
Harris was born in Belfast, Northern Ireland, and spent her early childhood there before her parents moved in 1965 to Glasgow, Scotland. Upon leaving school, she studied English Literature and Drama at the University of Glasgow, then trained as an actress at the East 15 Acting School in London.
After a few years of trying different careers, she worked various jobs abroad such as a dishwasher, a waitress, a chambermaid and an English language teacher. During this period, she began writing short stories while confined to her bed in Portugal with a bout of flu.
On her return to Glasgow, several of her short stories were published in anthologies. In the early 1990s, she was a regular panelist on STV's Scottish Books program.
She went on to obtain a Master's in Creative Writing at the University of East Anglia under Malcolm Bradbury. After gaining a distinction in her degree, she completed a PhD at the same university.
After UEA, she completed a two-year stint as the Arts Council of Great Britain Writer-in-Residence at HM Prison Durham (1992–4). Following this, Harris worked as both a script and novel reader, and a script editor for film companies and The Literary Consultancy. She also taught creative writing for many years, principally at the University of East Anglia.
Harris lives on the south coast of England.
Harris's 2006 debut, The Observations, was shortlisted for the Orange Prize for Fiction 2007. [5] It was Waterstones book of the month and Faber & Faber's lead debut fiction title for spring 2006 (with its biggest ever initial print run for a first book). [6] It was followed in 2011 by Gillespie and I , then in 2017 by Sugar Money.
Sugar Money was shortlisted for the Walter Scott Prize, The Wilbur Smith Prize for Adventure Writing and the Historical Writers Association Gold Crown Prize. [7] [8] [9] The Sunday Express wrote: "Pitches you headfirst into this outstanding, heartbreaking story of siblings, slavery and the savagery of the colonial past." [10] A review in The Irish Times wrote "Through masterful detail, Harris shows the dehumanisation of the brothers and their fellow slaves . . . Beautifully cadenced." [11]
![]() | This section of a biography of a living person does not include any references or sources .(June 2023) |
Her short stories have received a number of prizes including the Penguin/Observer Newspaper Short Story Award, 1993. She was awarded an Arts Council writer's grant in 2000.
Harris has been published in a wide variety of anthologies and literary magazines including New Writing 3, edited by Andrew Motion and Candice Rodd, and in several volumes of New Writing Scotland.
Her short story "Ascension" was commissioned for BBC Radio 3's The Verb. Harris read the story when it was broadcast live from the Radio Theatre at Broadcasting House on 6 May 2011.
![]() | This section of a biography of a living person does not include any references or sources .(June 2023) |
Harris has written a number of award-winning short films, culminating in 2000 when Bait (funded by Film4 Productions) was BAFTA-nominated. The film won the Kodak Award and Best Short at the Newport Film Festival in the US.
In 2001, Going Down (funded by Working Title Films) was also nominated for a BAFTA and won prizes for Best Drama at the BBC Short Film Festival, Best Short at the Angers Film Festival and was runner-up in the Turner Classic Movie Awards.
Harris was shortlisted in 1999 and 2000 for the BBC's Dennis Potter Awards.
![]() | This section of a biography of a living person does not include any references or sources .(June 2023) |
Kamila Shamsie FRSL is a Pakistani and British writer and novelist who is best known for her award-winning novel Home Fire (2017). Named on Granta magazine's list of 20 best young British writers, Shamsie has been described by The New Indian Express as "a novelist to reckon with and to look forward to." She also writes for publications including The Guardian, New Statesman, Index on Censorship and Prospect, and broadcasts on radio.
Barry Unsworth FRSL was an English writer known for his historical fiction. He published 17 novels, and was shortlisted for the Booker Prize three times, winning once for the 1992 novel Sacred Hunger.
Catherine Elizabeth Grenville is an Australian author. She has published fifteen books, including fiction, non-fiction, biography, and books about the writing process. In 2001, she won the Orange Prize for The Idea of Perfection, and in 2006 she won the Commonwealth Writers' Prize for The Secret River. The Secret River was also shortlisted for the Man Booker Prize.
Madeleine Thien is a Canadian short story writer and novelist. The Oxford Handbook of Canadian Literature has considered her work as reflecting the increasingly trans-cultural nature of Canadian literature, exploring art, expression and politics inside Cambodia and China, as well as within diasporic East Asian communities. Thien's critically acclaimed novel, Do Not Say We Have Nothing, won the 2016 Governor General's Award for English-language fiction, the Scotiabank Giller Prize, and the Edward Stanford Travel Writing Awards for Fiction. It was shortlisted for the 2016 Man Booker Prize, the 2017 Baileys Women's Prize for Fiction, and the 2017 Rathbones Folio Prize. Her books have been translated into more than 25 languages.
Tara June Winch is an Australian writer. She is the 2020 winner of the Miles Franklin Award for her book The Yield.
The Waterstones Children's Book Prize is an annual award given to a work of children's literature published during the previous year. First awarded in 2005, the purpose of the prize is "to uncover hidden talent in children's writing" and is therefore open only to authors who have published no more than two or three books, depending on which category they are in. The prize is awarded by British book retailer Waterstones.
Oneworld Publications is a British independent publishing firm founded in 1986 by Novin Doostdar and Juliet Mabey originally to publish accessible non-fiction by experts and academics for the general market. Based in London, it later added a literary fiction list and both a children's list and an upmarket crime list, and now publishes across a wide range of subjects, including history, politics, current affairs, popular science, religion, philosophy, and psychology, as well as literary fiction, crime fiction and suspense, and children's titles.
Eleanor Catton is a New Zealand novelist and screenwriter. Born in Canada, Catton moved to New Zealand as a child and grew up in Christchurch. She completed a master's degree in creative writing at the International Institute of Modern Letters. Her award-winning debut novel, The Rehearsal, written as her Master's thesis, was published in 2008, and has been adapted into a 2016 film of the same name. Her second novel, The Luminaries, won the 2013 Booker Prize, making Catton the youngest author ever to win the prize and only the second New Zealander. It was subsequently adapted into a television miniseries, with Catton as screenwriter. In 2023, she was named on the Granta Best of Young British Novelists list.
Samantha Harvey is an English novelist. She won the 2024 Booker Prize for her novel Orbital, which drew on conventions from multiple genres and fields, including literary fiction, science fiction, and philosophy.
The Walter Scott Prize for Historical Fiction is a British literary award founded in 2010. At £25,000, it is one of the largest literary awards in the UK. The award was created by the Duke and Duchess of Buccleuch, whose ancestors were closely linked to Scottish author Sir Walter Scott, who is generally considered the originator of historical fiction with the novel Waverley in 1814.
Anuradha Roy is an Indian novelist, journalist and editor. She has written five novels: An Atlas of Impossible Longing (2008), The Folded Earth (2011), Sleeping on Jupiter (2015), All the Lives We Never Lived (2018), and The Earthspinner (2021).
Kiran Ann Millwood Hargrave FRSL is a British poet, playwright and novelist. In 2023, she was elected a Fellow of the Royal Society of Literature.
Hannah Kent is an Australian writer, known for two novels – Burial Rites (2013) and The Good People (2016). Her third novel, Devotion, was published in 2021.
Patrice Lawrence MBE, FRSL is a British writer and journalist, who has published fiction both for adults and children. Her writing has won awards including the Waterstones Children's Book Prize for Older Children and The Bookseller YA Book Prize. In 2021, she won the Jhalak Prize's inaugural children's and young adult category for her book Eight Pieces of Silva (2020).
Christine Dwyer Hickey is an Irish novelist, short story writer and playwright. She has won several awards, including the Kerry Group Irish Novel of the Year and the Walter Scott Prize for Historical Fiction. Her writing was described by Madeleine Kingsley of the Jewish Chronicle as "depicting the parts of human nature that are oblique, suppressed and rarely voiced".
Jo Baker is a British writer. She is the author of six novels, including Longbourn. She has also written short stories for BBC Radio 4 and reviews for The Guardian and The New York Times Book Review. In 2018, she was awarded a Visiting Fellowship at the Queen's University Belfast, and she is currently an Honorary Fellow at Lancaster University.
Sugar Money, the third novel by British author Jane Harris, was first published by Faber and Faber in 2017 and shortlisted for several literary prizes including the Walter Scott Prize. The novel was also published in the United States by Arcade/Skyhorse, in Australia and New Zealand by Allen and Unwin and in Italy by Neri Pozza.
Lynda Clark is an author and creator of interactive fiction. Her short story, “Ghillie’s Mum” won the Commonwealth Short Story Prize for Europe and Canada in 2018, and was shortlisted for the BBC Short Story Award in 2019. Her debut novel, Beyond Kidding, was published by Fairlight Books in October 2019.
Lucy Treloar is an Australian novelist.
Cressida Connolly FRSL is an English novelist, biographer, journalist and critic. She is also the mother of English actress Nell Hudson.