Republic of Consciousness prize shares £20,000 pot between longlist

Shola von Reinhold wins the award for small publishing houses with their novel LOTE, but financial reward split between 10 publishers

The Scottish author Shola von Reinhold has won the Republic of Consciousness prize for small presses for their “dazzling” queer debut novel LOTE. But the £20,000 prize money will not go to von Reinhold alone: instead, in a first, it is being split between the 10 publishers on the longlist.

LOTE follows Mathilda, a black woman who becomes fixated by a forgotten black Scottish modernist poet. Released by London independent press Jacaranda as part of founder Valerie Brandes’ initiative to publish 20 black British writers in 2020, it is, said prize judge John Mitchinson, a dazzling novel that makes the reader “stand back and gasp at the wit, beauty and mischief von Reinhold has brocaded into the story”.

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