We’re delighted to announce that Simon Ashe-Browne has won the

2011 Dundee International Book Prize. Irish author Simon beat
out over a hundred entries and the final ten on the shortlist
to win the £10,000 prize and have his book, Nothing Human Left,
be published by Cargo.

Simon (26) won the prize for his novel `Nothing Human Left’ a
psychological thriller set in a Dublin public school as a schoolboy’s
criminal desires reach a frightening conclusion.

“Winning the Dundee International Book Prize and having my novel
published by Cargo is a major game changer for me” said Simon. “It
is the realisation of a dream I’ve had since I was eight years old and
a validation of all those house spent scratching away at the page.”

He was handed the prize at a gala dinner staged as part of the
Dundee Literary Festival, featuring leading authors and the actor Brian
Cox.

The £10,000 prize is the largest offered in the UK to unpublished
authors. Simon will also now speak at this week’s Dundee Literary
Festival at the University of Dundee. His winning book is now on sale.

The Dundee International Book Prize is a collaboration between the
University of Dundee, Cargo Publishing and Dundee City Council’s ‘One
City, Many Discoveries’ campaign. It has been sponsored this year by the
Apex City Quay Hotel & Spa.

The winner was picked by a panel of judges made up of Anna Day,
Director of Literary Dundee; Mark Buckland, Head of Cargo Publishing;
and Emily Dewhurst of Kitchen Press.

Mark Buckland, Managing Director of Cargo, said, “We’re delighted
to be the publisher for the prize and we’re looking to develop the
prize in the coming years into something that can really support and
energise authors like Simon.”

Anna Day, Director of Literary Dundee – a University of Dundee-led
initiative to promote interest in literature – said, “We have a very
deserving winner in Simon. This is a tremendous book and we hope to see
it go on to sell many copies. We received well over 100 high quality
entries from around the world but Simon’s book stood out.”

Councillor Will Dawson, convener of Dundee City Council’s city
development committee, said, “Our reputation as a centre of literary
and artistic excellence in many fields continues to develop and grow.
A rich storytelling tradition runs through Dundee, whether it be in
song, literature, as a narrative in a computer game or the plot of a
film and the city’s on-going association with encouraging the very best
in that tradition through new novel writing is reflected in the long
standing success of the Book Prize.”

From all at Cargo, we’d like to congratulate Simon with the win and
we’re delighted to be the official publisher for the prize. We’re hoping
this is the beginning of a long and successful partnership between
University of Dundee, Dundee City Council and the prize itself.

Nothing Human Left, a tense psychological thriller, is available in all
good bookstores and from us direct here at Cargo.