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May 28, 2009updated 10 Jan 2016 3:00pm

Spear’s Book Awards 2009 Shortlist Announced

By Spear's


The inaugural Spear’s Book Awards, celebrating the very best books of the year – from finance to fiction – will take place on June 30th, 2009, at a glamorous literary lunch held at the Landau restaurant in the five-star Langham, London.

Authors and celebrity judges from the worlds of literature, finance and society will be in attendance as prizes are given out for categories which include some of the most influential books of the past twelve months.

The lunch will become the annual sister event of the highly successful Spear’s Wealth Management Awards hosted for the last two years at Sotheby’s. The latter, which was featured on CNBC Europe, has rapidly established itself as the Oscars of financial awards.

The multi-award winning Spear’s is regarded as the New Yorker of finance titles and was shortlisted as ‘Magazine of the Year’ last year by the British Society of Magazine Editors (BSME). Editor William Cash has twice won Editor of the Year at the Independent Publishers PPA awards for his use of dazzling writers in Spear’s. Its website, featuring blogs, expert advice and party photos, is spearswms.com.

The glossy magazine has always been a showcase for the sharpest and most entertaining writing – with such talents as Andrew Roberts, Oscar Humphries, Anthony Haden Guest, Martin Vander Weyer, Luke Johnson and Peter York – and has proudly sponsored the prestigious Authors’ Club First Novel award for the last three years at the Arts Club in Mayfair. Spear’s books pages are edited by noted reviewer and Spear’s deputy editor Christopher Silvester.

The acclaimed Landau, whose kitchen is run by award-winning chef Andrew Turner, is the ideal stage to host a glittering literary awards lunch. The Langham is reopening after an extensive refurbishment which has enhanced its five-star reputation.

Buy all the books featured on the shortlist in Spear’s Amazon store

Financial Book Of The Year

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Philip Augar
Chasing Alpha: How Reckless Growth and Unchecked Ambition Ruined the City’s Golden Decade (Bodley Head)

Matthew Bishop and Michael Green
Philanthrocapitalism: How The Rich Can Save the World and Why We Should Let Them (A&C Black)

Vincent Cable
The Storm: The World Economic Crisis and What It Means (Atlantic Books)

William D. Cohan
House of Cards: How Wall Street’s Gamblers Broke Capitalism: The Fall of Bear Stearns and the Collapse of the Global Market (Allen Lane)

Gillian Tett
Fool’s Gold: How Unrestrained Greed Corrupted a Dream, Shattered Global Markets and Unleashed a Catastrophe (Little, Brown)

Buy all the books featured on the shortlist in Spear’s Amazon store
 
Biography Of The Year

Anne De Courcy
Snowdon: A Biography (Weidenfeld & Nicolson)

Caroline Moorehead
Dancing to the Precipice: Lucie De La Tour Du Pin and the French Revolution (Chatto & Windus)

Frances Osborne
The Bolter: The Woman Who Scandalised 1920s Society and Became White Mischief’s Infamous Seductress (Virago Press)

Michael Wolff
The Man Who Owns the News (Bodley Head)
Read Spear’s review here

Jackie Wullschlager
Chagall: Love and Exile (Allen Lane)

Buy all the books featured on the shortlist in Spear’s Amazon store

Financial History Book Of The Year

Liaquat Ahamed
Lords of Finance: 1929, the Great Depression and the Bankers Who Broke the World (William Heinemann)

Bryan Burrough
Big Rich: The Rise and Fall of the Texas Oil Millionaires (Penguin Press)

Charles D. Ellis
The Partnership: A History of Goldman Sachs (Allen Lane)
Read Spear’s review here

Niall Ferguson
The Ascent of Money (Allen Lane)

David Marsh
The Euro (Yale University Press)

Buy all the books featured on the shortlist in Spear’s Amazon store

Family History Of The Year

William Fiennes
The Music Room (Picador)

Jane Mulvagh
Madresfield (Doubleday)

Adam Nicolson
Sissinghurst: An Unfinished History (Harper Press)

Jane Wellesley
Wellington: A Journey Through My Family (Weidenfeld & Nicolson)

<p> Buy all the books featured on the shortlist in Spear’s Amazon store

Novel Of The Year

Sebastian Barry
The Secret Scripture (Faber & Faber)

Jonathan Littell
The Kindly Ones (Chatto & Windus)

Hilary Mantel
Wolf Hall (Fourth Estate)

Joseph O’Neill
Netherland (Pantheon Books)

Colm Toibin
Brooklyn (Viking)
 
Buy all the books featured on the shortlist in Spear’s Amazon store

Coffee-Table Book Of The Year

Mirabel Cecil and David Mlinaric
Mlinaric on Decorating (Frances Lincoln)                             

Marie-Noel de Gary and Jean-Marie del Moral
The Camondo Legacy: The Passions of a Paris Collector (Thames & Hudson)

Diana Donald and Jane Munro (eds)
Endless Forms: Natural Science and the Visual Arts (Yale University Press)

Robert Murphy and Ivan Terestchenko
The Private World of Yves Saint Laurent and Pierre Berge (Thames & Hudson)

Michael Snodin and Nigel Llewellyn
Baroque: Magnificence and Style (V&A Publishing)

David Yarrow
Nowhere (privately published)

Buy all the books featured on the shortlist in Spear’s Amazon store

For more information, please contact Josh Spero, Senior Editor, Spear’s magazine, at josh.spero@spearswms.com.

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