Wainwright Prize 2023 Winners
by Brandon King
The Wainwright Prize was created in Alfred Wainwright’s name to showcase the growing genre of nature-writing in publishing and to celebrate and encourage exploration of the outdoors to all readers.
Take a look at this year's winners from each category.
The Flow: Rivers, Waters and Wildness, by Amy-Jane Beer
Winner: Nature Writing
A visit to the rapid where she lost a cherished friend unexpectedly reignites Amy-Jane Beer's love of rivers setting her on a journey of natural, cultural and emotional discovery. On New Year's Day 2012, Amy-Jane Beer's beloved friend Kate set out with a small group of others to kayak the river Rawthey in the Howgill Fells. Kate never came home, and her death left her devoted family and friends bereft and unmoored. Finally visiting the Rawthey years later, Amy-Jane realises how much she misses the connection to the natural world she always felt when she was close to rivers, and so begins a new phase of exploration. The result is a book of many rivers and many voices.
The Lost Rainforests of Britain, by Guy Shrubsole
Winner: Writing on Conversation
In 2020, Guy Shrubsole moved from London to Devon. As he began to explore the wooded valleys, rivers and tors of Dartmoor, he discovered an extraordinary habitat that he had never come across before: temperate rainforest. Entranced, he would spend the coming months exploring and researching the history and distribution of rainforest in the British Isles. Britain, Guy discovered, was once a rainforest nation. This is the story of a unique habitat that has become so denuded and fragmented, most people today don't realise it exists.
Borrow The Lost Rainforests of Britain →
Leila and the Blue Fox, by Kiran Millwood Hargrave
Winner: Children's Writing on Nature
She was very tired. She lay down, her soft head on her soft paws. The sunset licked her face. The snow covered her like a blanket. Fox wakes, and begins to walk. She crosses ice and snow, over mountains and across frozen oceans, encountering bears and birds beneath the endless daylight of an Arctic summer, navigating a world that is vast, wild and wondrous. Meanwhile, Leila embarks on a journey of her own - finding her way to the mother who left her. On a breathtaking journey across the sea, Leila rediscovers herself and the mother she thought she'd lost, with help from a determined little fox.
Borrow Leila and the Blue Fox →
Find more recommendations for all ages.