Bog Child, which she completed shortly before she died, wins Dowd prize for second year running
Alison Flood writing in The Guardian
The late Siobhan Dowd has won Ireland's pre-eminent children's book prize for the second year running for a novel she completed shortly before she died. 
Dowd's posthumously published Bog Child, about a boy who discovers the body of a child in a bog in Ireland, was named Bisto children's book of the year by Children's Books Ireland in Dublin yesterday, beating titles including Airman by Eoin Colfer and Her Mother's Face by Roddy Doyle to take the €10,000 (£8,800) prize.
Children's Books Ireland said of Bog Child (David Fickling) that "to journey through this layered narrative is to be confronted with not only the frailty of life but also the redemptive qualities of love: unsettling yet optimistic, this is radiant prose that sings of the pain and beauty of the human condition".
Dowd died of cancer in August 2007 aged 47, having only begun writing Bog Child in January of that year. The award was accepted on her behalf by her sister, Oona Emerson, with the prize money – like the rest of Dowd's estate – to go to the trust she set up before she died which helps disadvantaged children discover the joy of reading.
Read the full report here.
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