Shortlist

Highland Book Prize 2025 Shortlist Announced

Titles from Kerri Andrews, Colin Bramwell, Mandy Haggith and Petra Johana Poncarová on the Highland Book Prize Shortlist

The shortlist for the Highland Book Prize 2025 has been announced by the Highland Society of London and Moniack Mhor, Scotland’s Creative Writing Centre. The prize is supported by the William Grant Foundation.

This award celebrates literature that comes from the rich landscape and culture of the Scottish Highlands and Islands. It is open to books of any genre written by authors who live in the Highlands or were born there, as well as books whose content represents the Highlands & Islands in some way.

Alex Ogilvie of the Highland Society of London and non-voting Chair of the Judging Panel said, “The panel had some very difficult decisions to make to get to the shortlist, which is testament to the range and skill demonstrated by each of the longlisted titles. It is an ongoing pleasure and a privilege to bring attention to the exceptionally fine work being produced across the Highlands and Islands, and I would like to extend warm congratulations to all four authors shortlisted for this year’s prize.”

The shortlist was selected by a judging panel: Jen Hadfield, poet and essayist, and winner of the 2024 Windham Campbell Prize; acclaimed multi-award winning fiction writer Cynan Jones; and Peter Mackay, poet, lecturer and broadcaster, and Scotland’s current Makar (national poet).

The judges said:

‘An Staran by Petra Johana Poncarová is an excellent treasure trove from 50 years of one of the most important Gaelic writers and editors; though Professor Derick Thomson is best known as a poet this volume gives abundant evidence of his skill, intelligence and irreverence as a critic, polemicist, and writer of short stories and non-fiction.’

‘Fower Pessoas by Colin Bramwell is a very strong collection of poems, by turns playful and emotionally and formally daring, making full use of the tonal variations and emotional range of Pessoa’s four heteronyms and bringing an iconoclastic and fearless approach to writing in Scots.’

‘The Lost Elms by Mandy Haggith is an engaging and moving book about the loss of elms from our landscape, full of botanical and cultural knowledge drawn from the author’s own experience. For all its sense of loss, however, it made us fall in love with elms in a hopeful way.’

‘Pathfinding by Kerri Andrews is a powerful discussion of walking, motherhood and post-natal depression, mixing open and raw evocation of personal experience with carefully chosen analysis of earlier writers and walkers. Throughout, Andrews gives you a sense of fellowship and community.’

The winner will be announced online on Tuesday 30^th June 2026.  They will receive a £2000 prize and a writing retreat at Moniack Mhor, Scotland’s Creative Writing Centre, close to Inverness in the Scottish Highlands.