Cult science Fiction author Chris Beckett wins Edge Hill University short story prize

Jul 9 2009 by Michael Byrne, Ormskirk Advertiser

CULT science fiction writer Chris Beckett has won this year’s Edge Hill University Short Story Prize.

Judges chose his book The Turing Test, with its tales of robots, alien planets, genetic manipulation and virtual reality over collections by Anne Enright, Shena Mackay, Ali Smith and Gerard Donovan.

The prize is the UK’s only award for a short story collection by a single author.

Chris was presented with the £5,000 prize and a specially commissioned painting by Liverpool artist, Pete Clarke, at a ceremony held by Edge Hill University on Saturday evening, 4 July, at the Bluecoat centre in Liverpool.

He was also awarded the £1,000 Readers’ Prize.

The phrase ‘The Turing Test’ refers to a proposal made by Alan Turing in 1950 as a way of dealing with the question, can of whether machines think?

Booker Prize winner Anne Enright won the second prize, worth £1,000, for her collection Yesterday’s Weather published by Vintage.

This year’s judges were James Walton, journalist and chair of BBC Radio 4’s The Write Stuff; author and 2008 winner Claire Keegan and Mark Flinn, Pro-Vice Chancellor of Edge Hill University.

James Walton commented: ‘I suspect Chris Beckett winning the Edge Hill Prize will be seen as a surprise in the world of books. In fact, though, it was also a bit of surprise to the judges, none of whom knew they were science fiction fans beforehand.

"Yet, once the judging process started, it soon became clear that The Turing Test was the book that we’d all been impressed by, and enjoyed, the most — and one by one we admitted it.

"This was a very strong shortlist, including two authors who’ve been Booker shortlisted in Ali Smith and Shena Mackay. Even so, it was Beckett who seemed to us to have written the most imaginative and endlessly inventive stories, fizzing with ideas. and complete with strong characters and big contemporary themes. We also appreciated the sheer zest of his story-telling."