Books

Your Women's Prize for Fiction Winner Is...

by Meredith Turits

Guys, it happened: The Goldfinch didn't win something for which it was nominated. But I'm sorry, let me not bury the lede on the real story here: Eimear McBride has won the 2014 Bailey's Women's Prize for Fiction for her novel A Girl is a Half-formed Thing. The book, which is about a young, disturbed Irish girl and her relationship to her brother who had a brain tumor as a child, is McBride's debut.

In a ceremony hosted on Wednesday night in London, the author beat out Donna Tartt's Pulitzer Prize-winning tome, along with titles by Jhumpa Lahiri, Hannah Kent, Audrey Magee, and 2007-winner Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie.

According to the judges — Mary Beard, Denise Mina, Caitlin Moran, Sophie Raworth, and chair Helen Fraser — to read McBride's novel is "to plunge inside into the narrator’s head, experiencing her world first-hand." A nice endorsement, I guess. Along with a suddenly skyrocketed profile — after all, she joins the company of former winners like A.M. Homes and Marilynne Robinson to name a few — McBride will pocket £30,000 (about $50,000).

A huge nod to McBride for her win — that's one well-deserved Bessie statue.