THE winner of the 2022 Scottish Teenage Book Prize has been awarded to Harry Cook for his novel Fin & Rye & Fireflies.
Now in its sixth year, the annual prize is run by the Scottish Book Trust with support from Creative Scotland and Browns Books, and encourages young people to read its shortlisted titles and vote for their favourite.
Fin & Rye & Fireflies emerged as this year’s winner with 40% of the overall vote from the more than 2000 teenagers who took part in school book clubs across Scotland.
The novel follows a sixteen-year-old boy as he moves to a new town and falls in love, but struggles with his family’s attempts at conversion therapy.
In addition to a £2000 prize for Cook, the two runners-up – Patience Arbabi for The Infinite and SM Wilson for The Infinity Files – will receive £500 each.
Cook, an Australian actor and international LGBTQI+ activist, said of his win: “It's difficult to describe how much this prize means to me. I'm awed to be in such incredible company and to have my little queer story recognized really does give me all the fireflies. Thank you so so much. Here's to more queer stories!”
Scottish Book Trust CEO Marc Lambert commented: “Many congratulations to Harry Cook on winning this year's Scottish Teenage Book Prize. Fin & Rye & Fireflies is an important story that clearly resonated with teenage readers across the country. We thank Browns Books and Creative Scotland for making this award possible, supporting Scottish Book Trust to celebrate fantastic titles.”
Browns Books manager Claire Smith added: “Congratulations to Harry Cook on winning the Scottish Teenage Book prize this year. I would like to extend our thanks to the team at Scottish Book Trust for the wonderful work they do. It has been a pleasure to support the team again this year.”
