Oxblood is one of those rare books where place and time are conjured so effortlessly, the caste of characters are drawn with so much ease and grace… Tom Benn is a seriously gifted writer and I’m keen to read whatever he does next.‘ I don't even know where to start with this book. First, Netgalley cataloged this as a YA book. It is so not a YA book. Victoria is twenty and a boring twenty at that. But she is not alone in her dullness. All of the spies and crime boss just feel kind of flat. In no way did this novel about international intrigue actually intrigue me. The whole book feels clunky like it doesn't quite fit together correctly. Several times while I was reading I thought that it felt like it needed a good editing which is why I wasn't surprised when I discovered that "Oxblood" started it's life as self-publish. It's a familiar story that has been told many times and has been told better many times. There was no sex (though there was temptation and a number of passionate kisses). There was a fair amount of bad language of wide variety. Overall, I'd recommend this novel. One of those rare books where place and time are conjured so effortlessly, the cast of characters drawn with so much ease and grace' -- MONA ARSHI

A blistering portrait of a family on fire, Oxblood lays bare the horror of violence, the exile of grief, and the extraordinary power of love. Oxbloodshows us that there are few places literature can't take us, if the writer is brave enough, and gifted enough' FRANCIS SPUFFORD I love YA thrillers and strong female characters, so when I saw this on NetGalley, I knew I had to take a look and see what it was about. Once she is involved with the team though, bad things start happening and some in the team start suspecting she might be a mole, but who the real mole was will surprise them all.She's really worried, so off to Italy she flies. Starting with the last hotel that he stayed in, she starts asking questions. To her surprise, she's greeted by a good looking man .. pointing a gun at her. Seems like he's looking for her brother, as well. Congratulations, Tom, on winning the Sunday Times Young Writer of the Year Award. What does it mean to you?

Administered by the Society of Authors, the Young Writer of the Year Award works with a growing network of partners, including retail partner Waterstones and our overseas partner the British Council, to provide a critical support system to the very best talent at work right now. We are thrilled that Tom Benn has won this year’s Sunday Times Charlotte Aitken Young Writer of the Year Award. Oxblood is fiction at its most urgent and affecting, and readers will be hugely grateful to discover it as a result of this well-deserved accolade. The award carries terrific prestige and Waterstones are proud to partner with the Sunday Times to reach as many new readers as possible.‘ For over 30 years, the UK’s most influential prize for young writers has been a definitive indicator of rising literary talent in Britain and Ireland, and Tom Benn joins an illustrious list of previous winners, including last year’s winner Cal Flyn, as well as Zadie Smith, Simon Armitage, Max Porter, Sally Rooney and Robert Macfarlane. His writing style is raw, powerful, and all the other descriptions in the quotes on the cover, but it was always (for me) comprehensible. I did look up a few of the dialect words. His unconventional use of punctuation didn’t throw me like Evaristo’s, though. It is always clear what is going on and why he has chosen to break lines up etc.I was drawn to this novel simply by the fact that it is set in the Wythenshawe and Manchester of the 60's, 70's and 80's that I grew up in and where my paternal grandparents lived. There's a fascination in reading fiction that references places that we know. The judges chose Tom Benn from a compelling shortlist of four authors, each producing innovative, forward-thinking narratives that pushed the boundaries of language and form, with Johanna Thomas-Corr commenting that each shortlisted writer had ‘set themselves free of publishing conventions’. In Larger than an Orange, Lucy Burns draws together an intimate memoir exploring the personal and public experience of abortion, in Maps of Our Spectacular Bodies, Maddie Mortimer poetically examines disease and mortality, and Katherine Rundell interrogates John Donne’s meditations on corporeal existence in the animated biography of his work, Super-Infinite (the only non-fiction title on the list). This was definitely a great story. I loved the action, suspense, non blood family, betrayal, lies, secrets , mystery, bravery, human trafficing, even a little romancebut so much more. The plot was excellantsome errors in grammer and spelling but an easy fix and didn’t detract from the story. I loved all the ins and outs from this awesome storyespecially those with Vic and I highly recommend. Much of my poetry has been inspired or provoked by the blues’ ] Have you ever made a literary pilgrimage? Tom Benn is one of publishing’s best kept secrets. His story about the struggles of three generations of women in a Manchester crime clan has been rendered with such care and specificity that it feels wholly original. The result is a rich, dark, atmospheric family saga that contains so much buried love and anger and grief and sexual jealousy and bitter disappointment. In fact, it’s one of the best contemporary novels about disappointment that I have ever read. Yet somehow I emerged from it exhilarated! I’m thrilled that we are rewarding a young writer who has been working below the radar for a while and is now finally getting the attention he deserves.‘

Oxblood is a propulsive, bountiful, fearless work of literary art. The female characters at the heart of Benn’s tale are single-minded, dogged and so completely convinced of themselves and their actions, that the reader is persuaded to be stirred by them and to remember them. It is clear that this is only the beginning for Tom Benn. His work is a vehicle for that rare unflinching look at our rawness, our brutality and our vulnerability.‘ One good thing about judging a prize like this is that you approach a book without context or preconception and get to just plunge in. And Oxblood is a book to get lost headlong in. Tom Benn manages to be heart-felt and attentive and generous, without ever resorting to being sentimental. In fact this is a book of anti-sentimental greatness, wonderfully written, deft and pungent and sensuous. It is brave too, telling a tale without fear of ugliness, without seeking to smooth over the bumps of lived life at all. It is honest and truthful, but also a great feat of fiction. And he writes amazing female characters as well. It felt right to give him the prize not just as a reward for this massive achievement, but as a nod towards the novels he’s going to write in the future, which we have a feeling will be great.‘ Francis Spufford: ‘I’ve always loved novels best as a reader, but for a long time I was too timid to take the plunge’ ] Which writers, living or dead, would you invite to your dream dinner party?

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An unruly novel about northern nanas in a haunted council house probably sounded like a risky investment to mainstream gatekeepers. There was little that was recent and comparable with Oxblood to point at and say: Well, that broke through; this might just too. What are the traps and tropes associated with working-class fiction? I’ve been a pilgrim for art and film: visiting Den Bosch for Bosch’s paintings, and Poulsbo and North Bend [in] Washington for Twin Peaks. I’d love to reach Oxford, Mississippi, for a Faulkner pilgrimage. What is the best writing advice you have heard? Billed as a book for teens, I wasn't expecting to get hooked from the very beginning. It's very well written with a lot of action to keep the reader entertained. I love the characters. Victoria is a gutsy young woman who will do anything to find her brother. Ian is the man from Interpol and having such a serious job as leader of his specific group makes him appear very solemn and serious.. but Victoria sees the softer side of him.

When I first moved to Norwich from Manchester at 18, I was dismissive of how small and slow the place seemed by comparison. But it’s a regional outlier innovating from the margins, welcoming and incubating talent from everywhere. Now I teach creative writing part-time at the University of East Anglia. It’s the city to hide out in and write books. What is your favourite quotation? And then there is Jan - the teenage tearaway running as fast as she can from her mother, her grandmother, and her own unnamed baby.So, Ian as a love interest irritated me but Ian as a spy was ultra-cool. And, I wish there had been more of Claudia. She was incredibly intriguing and I would have enjoyed seeing her interact with Vic more than they did.