Stephen Fry wins biography of the year title

Stephen Fry wins biography of the year title
Stephen Fry wins biography of the year title (Image credit: PA)

Stephen Fry beat Tony Blair and Lord Sugar when his memoirs landed the biography of the year title at the Galaxy National Book Awards. He was honoured for his second volume of memoirs, The Fry Chronicles, at a ceremony attended by stars and figures from the publishing world. Literary veterans Terry Pratchett and Martin Amis were given awards for outstanding achievement in recognition of their contribution to the publishing industry. Comedian David Walliams's book Mr Stink lost out in the award for best children's title to Zog, a tale about an accident-prone dragon created by Julia Donaldson and Axel Scheffler, the celebrated creators of The Gruffalo. Pratchett - the Discworld novelist who has been battling Alzheimer's disease - said of his win: "I'm amazed. You find something that you like doing and do well and keep on doing it and suddenly they give you an award, when all I was really doing was having a lot of fun." Broadcaster and political commentator Andrew Marr landed the non-fiction prize for The Making Of Modern Britain, beating fellow nominees including Lady Antonia Fraser and Bill Bryson. Popular fiction book of the year went to David Nicholls' One Day, beating the likes of Jilly Cooper, while Hilary Mantel picked up the UK author of the year prize, seeing off competition from Maggie O'Farrell and Kate Atkinson. Yotam Ottolenghi beat Jamie Oliver, Nigella Lawson and Nigel Slater to food and drink book prize for Plenty. American author Jonathan Franzen - who became a worldwide sensation for his book The Corrections - collected the International author of the year trophy for Freedom.

Patrick McLennan

Patrick McLennan is a London-based journalist and documentary maker who has worked as a writer, sub-editor, digital editor and TV producer in the UK and New Zealand. His CV includes spells as a news producer at the BBC and TVNZ, as well as web editor for Time Inc UK. He has produced TV news and entertainment features on personalities as diverse as Nick Cave, Tom Hardy, Clive James, Jodie Marsh and Kevin Bacon and he co-produced and directed The Ponds, which has screened in UK cinemas, BBC Four and is currently available on Netflix. 


An entertainment writer with a diverse taste in TV and film, he lists Seinfeld, The Sopranos, The Chase, The Thick of It and Detectorists among his favourite shows, but steers well clear of most sci-fi.