The Walter Scott Prize for Historical Fiction is a British literary award founded in 2010.[1] At £25,000, it is one of the largest literary awards in the UK.[2] The award was created by the Duke and Duchess of Buccleuch, whose ancestors were closely linked to Scottish author Sir Walter Scott, who is generally considered the originator of historical fiction with the novel Waverley in 1814.[3]
Eligible books must have been first published in the UK, Ireland or Commonwealth in the preceding year.[1] For the purpose of the award, historical fiction is defined as being that where the main events take place more than 60 years ago, i.e. outside of any mature personal experience of the author.[1] The winner is announced each June at the Borders Book Festival in Melrose.[1]
| Year | Author | Title | Story and setting | Result | Ref. |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2010 | Wolf Hall | Thomas Cromwell (1490s–1532) | Winner | [4] [5] [6] | |
| Hodd | Robin Hood (early medieval) | Shortlist | [7] [8] | ||
| Lustrum | Cicero (106–43 BC) | ||||
| Sacred Hearts | 16th-century Italian convent | ||||
| Stone's Fall | Early 20th-century mystery/thriller | ||||
| The Glass Room | 1930s Czech | ||||
| The Quickening Maze | John Clare and Alfred Tennyson (early 19th century) | ||||
| 2011 | The Long Song | 1820s Jamaica | Winner | [9] [10] | |
| C | Turn of the 20th-century Europe | Shortlist | |||
| Ghost Light | 20th-century England and Ireland | ||||
| Heartstone | England during the summer of 1545 | ||||
| The Thousand Autumns of Jacob de Zoet | late 18th-century Shogun Japan | ||||
| To Kill A Tsar | St. Petersburg around the turn of the 20th century | ||||
| 2012 | On Canaan's Side | 20th-century Ireland and Chicago | Winner | [11] [12] | |
| Half-Blood Blues | World War II-era Europe | Shortlist | [13] | ||
| Pure | Paris in 1786 | ||||
| The Quality of Mercy | London of 1767 and a Durham coastal mining village | ||||
| The Sisters Brothers | Oregon and California in 1851 | ||||
| The Stranger's Child | World War I-era Europe | ||||
| 2013 | The Garden of Evening Mists | 1940s and '50s Malaya | Winner | [14] [15] | |
| Bring Up the Bodies | Thomas Cromwell (1532–1536) | Shortlist | [16] | ||
| 1680s England | |||||
| The Daughters of Mars | WWI | ||||
| The Streets | 1880s London | ||||
| Toby's Room | WWI | ||||
| 2014 | An Officer and a Spy | Dreyfus Affair, which took place in France in the late 1890s | Winner | [17] [18] | |
| Fair Helen | 1590s in the Borderland of Scotland and England | Shortlist | [19] [20] | ||
| Harvest | remote English village following the Enclosure Act in the 18th century | ||||
| Life After Life | during the 20th century | ||||
| The Luminaries | New Zealand gold rush of the 19th century | ||||
| The Promise | 1900 Galveston hurricane | ||||
| 2015 | The Ten Thousand Things | China in the 14th century | Winner | [21] [22] | |
| A God in Every Stone | India during WWI | Shortlist | [23] [24] | ||
| Arctic Summer | India in the early 20th century | ||||
| In the Wolf's Mouth | Italy in World War II | ||||
| The Lie | England during WWI | ||||
| The Zone of Interest | Europe during World War II | ||||
| Viper Wine | England in the 17th century | ||||
| 2016 | Tightrope | France WWII | Winner | [25] [26] | |
| A Place Called Winter | early 20th century Saskatchewan | Shortlist | [27] [28] | ||
| End Games in Bordeaux | France WWII | ||||
| Mrs Engels | 19th century England | ||||
| Salt Creek | mid-19th century Australia | ||||
| Sweet Caress | 20th century global | ||||
| 2017 | Days Without End | US Civil War | Winner | [29] [30] | |
| A Country Road, A Tree | WWII France | Shortlist | [31] [32] | ||
| Golden Hill | 18th century New York | ||||
| Mothering Sunday | 1924 | ||||
| The Good People | 19th century Ireland | ||||
| The Gustav Sonata | Switzerland during WWII | ||||
| The Vanishing Futurist | Russia early Soviet era | ||||
| 2018 | The Gallows Pole | Yorkshire 18th century | Winner | [33] [34] | |
| Grace | 19th century Ireland | Shortlist | [35] [36] | ||
| Manhattan Beach | WWII New York | ||||
| Miss Boston and Miss Hargreaves | WWII | ||||
| Sugar Money | 18th century Martinique and Grenada | ||||
| The Wardrobe Mistress | 1940s London | ||||
| 2019 | The Long Take | American, post WWII | Winner | [37] | |
| A Long Way From Home | 1950s Australia | Shortlist | [38] [39] | ||
| After The Party | 1938 England | ||||
| Now We Shall Be Entirely Free | 1809 Spain | ||||
| The Western Wind | 1491 | ||||
| Warlight | 1945 London | ||||
| 2020 | The Narrow Land | 1950s, Cape Cod | Winner | [40] [41] [42] | |
| A Sin Of Omission | late 19th century, South Africa and England | Shortlist | [43] [44] | ||
| Shadowplay | 1878, London | ||||
| The Parisian | pre-WWI, Europe, Palestine | ||||
| The Redeemed | WWI, West Country, England | ||||
| To Calais, In Ordinary Time | 14th century, England | ||||
| 2021 | The Mirror & the Light | Thomas Cromwell (1536–1540) | Winner | [45] [46] | |
| A Room Made of Leaves | early colonial period, Australia | Shortlist | [47] [48] | ||
| Hamnet | late 16th century, Stratford-upon-Avon | ||||
| The Dictionary of Lost Words | 1880s–1920s, Oxford | ||||
| The Tolstoy Estate | 1812 and 1941, Russia | ||||
| 2022 | News of the Dead | Fictitious Highland glen through three different eras | Winner | [49] | |
| Rose Nicholson | Scotland of the 1570s | Shortlist | [50] | ||
| Fortune | Caribbean oil rush of the 1920s | ||||
| The Magician | Twentieth-century Europe, seen though the life of Thomas Mann | ||||
| 2023 | These Days | Northern Ireland, Belfast Blitz 1940s | Winner | [51] [52] | |
| Adrian Duncan | The Geometer Lobochevsky | Rural Ireland 1800s | Shortlist | [53] | |
| Act of Oblivion | England 17th century | ||||
| The Chosen | England, Thomas Hardy 1800s | ||||
| The Sun Walks Down | South Australia 1800s | ||||
| Ancestry | Crimea and England 1850s | ||||
| I am not your Eve | Tahiti, Paul Gauguin 1800s | ||||
| 2024 | Hungry Ghosts | Harrowing epic set in 1940s Trinidad | Winner | [54] | |
| The New Life | Gay community in 1890s London | Shortlist | |||
| My Father's House | Jews and POWs escape from the Gestapo in WWII Rome | ||||
| In the Upper Country | Underground Railroad refugees resettle in 1800s Ontario, Canada | ||||
| Absolutely and Forever | Broken relationships in 1960s London and Paris | ||||
| The House of Doors | Murder mystery and end of colonialism in early 20th C Penang, Malaysia |