Winner of £25,000 Royal Society Winton Prize for Science Books to be announced 25 November

Shortlist in running for biggest cash prize in history of competition

The winner of the Royal Society Winton Prize for Science Books will be announced on Monday 25^th November at a free public event hosted by comedian and television presenter, Dara O Briain.  Six books are competing for a cash prize of £25,000, the largest ever in the history of the award. The Royal Society Winton Prize for Science Books is considered to be the world’s most prestigious award for popular science writing.

The prize money for the winner has increased from £10,000 to £25,000 this year while the authors of each of the shortlisted books will receive £2,500 instead of the previous £1,000 award.  The shortlist, announced in September, features:

Bird Sense by Tim Birkhead, published by Bloomsbury

The Particle at the End of the Universe by Sean Carroll, published by OneWorld Publications

Cells to Civilizations by Enrico Coen, published by Princeton University Press

Pieces of Light by Charles Fernyhough, published by Profile Books

The Book of Barely Imagined Beings by Caspar Henderson, published by Granta

Ocean of Life by Callum Roberts, published by Allen Lane (Penguin Books)

The first chapter of each book is available to download for free at: royalsociety.org/awards/science-books/.

The judges on this year’s judging panel are Jon Culshaw, impressionist and comedian; Dr Emily Flashman, Royal Society Dorothy Hodgkin Fellow at University of Oxford; Professor Uta Frith DBE FBA FRS (Chair), Emeritus Professor of Cognitive Development at University College London; Joanne Harris, novelist and author of Chocolat; and Lucy Siegle, journalist and writer on environmental issues.