Online retailer Amazon UK has taken on big awards such as the Man Booker and Costa Book Awards by launching its own literary prize – for self-published ebooks.
The Kindle Storyteller Prize carries a cash award of £20,000: far smaller than the £50,000 Man Booker Prize, but equal to the winner's purse offered by the country's two biggest poetry book awards, the TS Eliot Prize and Forward Prize.
The prize is open to any author who publishes their book through Kindle Direct Publishing between February 20 and May 19 this year. Etries from any genre are eligible – including fiction, non-fiction and collections of short stories – so long as they are more than 5,000 words and previously unpublished. Once published, individual printed copies of any of the books can also be ordered via Amazon's print-on-demand service.
The announcement follows a number of high-profile success stories in recent years: EL James's best-selling erotic novel 50 Shades of Grey
began life as a self-published ebook, while thriller writer Rachel
Abbott's first six self-published Kindle novels have together sold more
than 2.5 million copies worldwide.
"Great books deserve to be celebrated and that’s what we want to do with the Kindle Storyteller competition,” said an Amazon spokesperson. "Publishing a book has never been easier, and the Kindle Storyteller Award will reward the author whose story resonates most with both readers and literary experts." Amazon will use readers' interest in different titles online to help decide the shortlist, before the winner is chosen by an as-yet-unannounced panel of "both Amazon experts and literary authorities."
"Great books deserve to be celebrated and that’s what we want to do with the Kindle Storyteller competition,” said an Amazon spokesperson. "Publishing a book has never been easier, and the Kindle Storyteller Award will reward the author whose story resonates most with both readers and literary experts." Amazon will use readers' interest in different titles online to help decide the shortlist, before the winner is chosen by an as-yet-unannounced panel of "both Amazon experts and literary authorities."
The new initiative could be seen
as an attempt to shore up the Kindle, Amazon's electronic reading
tablet, after a reported decline in sales: in 2015, Waterstones chief
James Daunt said Kindle sales had "disappeared to all intents and purposes”.
Sales of digital books are also less healthy than before. A 2016 survey of major publishers showed ebook sales were in decline for the first time on record, having shrunk 2.4% over the previous year.
Estimates vary for the market value of Britain's self-published ebooks, but in 2015 Neilsen put the annual total of self-published UK book sales (both in print and online) at £58 million.
Entries for the Kindle Storyteller Prize open on February 20: www.amazon.co.uk/storyteller
Sales of digital books are also less healthy than before. A 2016 survey of major publishers showed ebook sales were in decline for the first time on record, having shrunk 2.4% over the previous year.
Estimates vary for the market value of Britain's self-published ebooks, but in 2015 Neilsen put the annual total of self-published UK book sales (both in print and online) at £58 million.
Entries for the Kindle Storyteller Prize open on February 20: www.amazon.co.uk/storyteller
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