Debut novel by Karen Raney wins Pat Kavanagh Prize 

All the Water in the World is told from the alternating points of view of a fifteen year old girl in the last year of her life, and that of her mother who is faced with a secret her daughter left behind.    

 

The Pat Kavanagh Prize is presented annually to an outstanding graduate of the MA Creative & Live Writing programme at Goldsmiths.  The £500 prize, created in memory of the much-admired literary agent, who died in 2008, is a awarded by a team of her colleagues at United Agents.  Previous winners were Jonathan Holt, David Nash, Giovanna Iozzi, Julia Rotte, Luiza Sauma, Paul Carney and Bex Barton.

 

Blake Morrison, Professor of Creative Writing at Goldsmiths, said:

 

'Sarah Ballard and her colleagues at United Agents who judge the prize felt that this year's was an especially strong shortlist, so it's all the more commendable that Karen should have won. Her novel is told from the point of view both of a teenage girl who's terminally ill and of her mother - tough subject matter but tackled with real insight in beautifully written prose.'

 

Karen Raney runs the Doctorate in Fine Art at University of East London and is author of Art in Question and other works of art theory.  She has been a nurse in the San Francisco county jail, education officer for Arts Council England, and editor of the art journal engage.  She lives in London.

 

The Pat Kavanagh Prize readings and awards ceremony was held on 11 January in the Richard Hoggart Building at Goldsmiths, University of London.  The other shortlisted writers were Anne Bayley, Amanda Chan Liling, Oliver Maitland Hudson, Fiona Mason and Joanna Munro.