The shortlist for the 2019 Costa Book Awards has been announced. 

Launched in 1971, the Costa Book Awards is one of the UK's most prestigious and popular book prizes and celebrates the most enjoyable books of the year by writers resident in the UK and Ireland. The categories that are recognised including First Novel, Novel, Biography, Poetry and Children’s Book. Each category is judged separately, by a panel of three judges per category. One of the five winning books will be selected as the overall Costa Book of the Year.   The Costa Book of the Year is then chosen by a nine-member panel which includes representatives from the original panels who are joined by other well-known people who love reading. The Category Winners will be announced on Monday, January 6 with the Costa Book of the Year announced on January 28.  You can find the shortlist in full below.  2019 Costa First Novel Award shortlist

• Diary of a Somebody by Brian Bilston (Picador)
• Queenie by Candice Carty-Williams (Trapeze)
• The Confessions of Frannie Langton by Sara Collins (Viking)
• The Other Half of Augusta Hope by Joanna Glen (The Borough Press)

2019 Costa Novel Award shortlist

• Middle England by Jonathan Coe (Viking)
• Confession with Blue Horses by Sophie Hardach (Head of Zeus)
• Starling Days by Rowan Hisayo Buchanan (Sceptre)
• Shadowplay by Joseph O’Connor (Harvill Secker)

2019 Costa Biography Award shortlist

• On Chapel Sands: My mother and other missing persons by Laura Cumming (Chatto & Windus)
• The Volunteer: The True Story of the Resistance Hero who Infiltrated Auschwitz by Jack Fairweather (WH Allen)
• In Extremis: The Life of War Correspondent Marie Colvin by Lindsey Hilsum (Chatto & Windus)
• The Making of Poetry: Coleridge, the Wordsworths and Their Year of Marvels by Adam Nicolson (William Collins)

2019 Costa Poetry Award shortlist

• Surge by Jay Bernard (Chatto & Windus)
• Flèche by Mary Jean Chan (Faber & Faber)
• The Mizzy by Paul Farley (Picador)
• Reckless Paper Birds by John McCullough (Penned in the Margins)

2019 Costa Children’s Award shortlist

• Asha & the Spirit Bird by Jasbinder Bilan (Chicken House)
• Crossfire by Malorie Blackman (Penguin Books)
• In the Shadow of Heroes by Nicholas Bowling (Chicken House)
• Furious Thing by Jenny Downham (David Fickling Books)