June saw an 'Orange' glow about Stockport!
The Orange Prize is one of the UK's most prestigious literary awards, chosen annually for the best original full-length novel by a female author of any nationality, written in English and published in the UK in the preceding year. For several years we have celebrated this occasion and it's become an annual event in our reader development calendar. However this year we felt it was time for a change, with a new venue, new date, and new format!
Where?
In the main lending area in Central Library, Stockport, where there is a wonderful area under the impressive dome!
When?
Wednesday 3rd June 2009 from 7-9pm, the actual night of the voting in London, so we could compare our choice of winner to the judges' decision!
Format?
This year we decided to create a 'book fayre' atmosphere with book stalls, more interactive discussion, readings, quizzes, voting, and refreshments. Happily this format did increase audience participation, and seemed to go down well.
On the night...
The evening began as everyone gathered together to start our Orange celebrations with a brief introduction to the history of Orange and all the night's shortlisted titles. This year we wanted to allow our guests a chance to mingle, both with each other and staff, to get the most enjoyment out of our Orange discussion. We had six tables set up around the library, one for each book from the shortlist, and these 'stalls' were looked after by a member of staff who was championing their chosen shortlisted book. Our advocates chatted and gave out information leaflets about the authors and books (and nibbles and sweets!) so that everyone could share their opinions in an informal, fun environment Our guests could move around freely, sampling our Orange-themed food and drink (think carrots, cheese sticks, and Jaffa cakes!) as well as completing the quiz we'd handed out. All the answers could be found at the different book stalls, and we hoped this would act as an incentive to get everyone moving round and visiting all the tables to hear the advocates talk about their chosen book. It did encourage movement and discussion on the merits (or not!) of the titles in the running for the Orange Prize.
At the end of the evening we awarded a prize of a signed copy of a popular book to a randomly selected guest from participants who had the highest score in the quiz. We then all came back together to have readings from each of the books to give a flavour of the writing style and to help remind everyone of the stories and their favourites. The evening culminated with everyone voting for their Orange winner, and we then announced the actual winner, which we did with due ceremony!
One of the reasons we held the event on the actual night of the official ceremony was that we wanted to have a live link to the ceremony in London, but unfortunately this year this wasn't on offer due to IT difficulties. It would have been great to have been able to compare our voting to the live event!
Our winner did differ with the official decision - our first prize went to 'Burnt Shadows' by Kamila Shamsie - Stockport's favourite title.
The future's bright!
The night was a huge success thanks to the excitement and participation from our guests and the enthusiasm and hard work from our staff. Everyone got a chance to share their love for reading in a variety of different ways and there was the opportunity for lots of different kinds of reading group members from across the borough to meet and talk to each other
We had 120 people join us to celebrate the Orange Prize 2009, which when you think there was no author visits or other major incentives, just the chance to enjoy an evening discussing books is a very respectable audience!
We also had some positive comments from guests who liked the new style of meeting -
'I liked the new format of the evening. Also appreciated the new setting'
'I enjoyed the venue -airy and bright. Liked the new concept -moving around and meeting /questioning the advocates.'
'I liked speaking to people who had read the books. They were all so enthusiastic about them and very knowledgeable as well.'
'A new type of 'group' meeting'
'I liked hearing about all the books nominated and the reviews given by individuals and their personal views on each novel.'
'I enjoyed hearing the readings from each book, the voting and seeing the difference with the real results!'
Noreen Renshaw and Jenny Barber. - November 2009
