COLIN Barrett has scooped the 2014 Guardian First Book Award with his revealing debut on small town life in Ireland.
Young Skins is a lyrical collection of short stories by the Co. Mayo native, whose work has appeared in Irish literary journal The Stinging Fly since 2009.
The unique collection, which is both compelling and at times at times excruciating to read, offers tales of violence and drug addicts as well as modern love and tenderness as it paints a picture of modern life in small town Ireland.
Of the book, Barrett claims: “It is full of usual things that transpire within the confines of any small town…misjudgments and violence, affairs and kindnesses, silences and eruptions.”
The 32-year-old adds: “I grew up in a town like this, knew people infused with the same peculiar sensibility as this cast of characters.”
Guardian Review Editor Lisa Allardice, who chaired the judging panel, today announced their decision.
“Colin Barrett has already been hailed as a ‘new, young genius’ – and you can’t get much better than that,” she said.
“It was a particularly strong shortlist and each of the titles was ardently debated, but in the end we had to go with the book that, in the words of one of the judges, was ‘simply the best written’ – and it is true that Barrett barely hits a false note throughout the collection.”
Allardice was joined on the panel by the classicist Mary Beard, shadow secretary of state for education Tristram Hunt and psychoanalyst and literary theorist Josh Cohen.
The Guardian First Book Award, established in 1999, replacing the Guardian Fiction Award, is worth £10,000 to the winner.
Barrett follows in the footsteps of fellow Irish author Donal Ryan, who won the 2013 award with his debut The Spinning Heart.
