The HW Fisher Best First Biography Prize 2012 short list

The Biographers’ Club is delighted to announce the short list for this year’s HW Fisher Best First Biography Prize, worth £5,000, thanks to the generous sponsorship of HW Fisher & Company, a leading firm of chartered accountants who specialise in consulting services to authors. This is the second year of their sponsorship.

The shortlisted entrants are:

Ian Donaldson – Ben Jonson: A Life (OUP)
Joanna Hodgkin – Amateurs in Eden (Virago)
Louise Miller – A Fine Brother: The Life of Captain Flora Sandes (Alma Books)
Thomas Penn – Winter King (Penguin)
W. Sydney Robinson – Muckraker: The Scandalous Life and Times of W.T. Stead (Robson Press)
Tom Williams – A Mysterious Something in the Light: Raymond Chandler (Aurum)

The Prize will be awarded to the best book by a first-time biographer, as chosen by our panel of judges: Julie Kavanagh, whose subjects include Frederick Ashton and Rudolf Nureyev; David Sexton, literary editor of the Evening Standard; and Stephanie Williams, author of Hongkong Bank, Olga’s Story and Running the Show: Governors of the British Empire.