Rowan Reddington, a 2025 Brunel creative writing graduate, wins the first Brunel Prize; five writers make the Nero New Writers Prize shortlist, decided 18 Nov.

The first Brunel Prize, a short story award open only to Brunel University of London students and recent graduates, has gone to Rowan Reddington, who finished a BA in Creative Writing at the Uxbridge university last year with First Class Honours.

His story, Things I Learn from Trees, follows a tree surgeon through a working day as he travels from job to job with the rest of his crew. The win brings him £1,000 and a scholarship to study for an MA in Creative Writing at Brunel.

The award was announced today alongside the shortlist for the Nero New Writers Prize, which Caffè Nero’s Nero Book Awards run in association with Brunel. Five writers from around the UK and Ireland were picked from more than 800 eligible entries, and the winner will be named at a ceremony at Brunel on Wednesday 18 November.

What the judge said about the Brunel Prize winner

The Brunel Prize was chosen by Paul Murray, the novelist who won the 2023 Nero Gold Prize for The Bee Sting and who chairs this year’s judges. The awards describe Reddington’s story as one where “tragedy and frivolity converge, and amidst the jesting and jibes, it is clear that not everything can be shared openly among colleagues.”

Murray said: “Things I Learn from Trees by Rowan Reddington, winner of the Brunel Prize, depicts a day in the life of an arborist as he makes his way around drought-blasted London. Poetic, compassionate, full of humour and wisdom, Reddington’s story glisters with vivid details of both of the tree surgeon crew and the ailing trees they encounter.

“A love letter to the city and to the embattled natural world, and a portrait of man drawing on all his resources of art and empathy to get through a heatwave, this story introduces a writer of huge talent. I can’t wait to read what he writes next.”

Head and shoulders portrait of the novelist Paul Murray
Paul Murray, chair of the judges, who chose the Brunel Prize winner. Photo: via the Nero Book Awards

The Brunel Prize is new for 2026. It is open to students currently at Brunel or who graduated in the last two years, and the awards say it was set up “in recognition of the University’s excellence in creative writing”. It is judged on the same terms as the main prize: an unpublished short story, fiction or narrative non-fiction, of up to 5,000 words, for children or adults.

The five stories on the Nero New Writers Prize shortlist

The shortlist was chosen by Murray with Bernardine Evaristo, the Booker Prize winner and Professor of Creative Writing at Brunel, and Helen Cullen, Reader in Creative Writing at Brunel. In the awards’ own summaries, with the judges’ words:

  • Conamar by Harriet Bradley. A daughter working as a nurse in England returns to the west of Ireland with her siblings to bury their mother, and old tensions resurface. The judges called it “emotionally impactive” and “suspenseful”.
  • The 10:52 From Edinburgh to London by Saadiya Chaudary Alam. On a train with her granddaughter, an elderly woman born into a Muslim family in Northern India before Partition looks back on a life of loss, upheaval and second chances that she has hidden from her family. The judges called it “evocative” and praised her “excellent storytelling skills”.
  • The Column by Eleanor James. Margot, an exhausted mother and wife caring for her dying mother, writes a popular anonymous column about her life and has to decide whether to reveal who she is. The judges called it “beautifully written”, “original” and “unpredictable”.
  • Jesus Finch by Tom Milner. A preacher and oddball known across Birmingham’s homeless community is helped by the narrator to reconnect with an old flame. The judges called it “an electric story full of narrative propulsion, energy and strong characterisation”.
  • Holding On by Donagh O’Malley. An artist living in New York visits his parents in Ireland, possibly for the last time, after an HIV diagnosis. The judges called it “sensitive and soulful” and “poignant”.

Four of the five are fiction and one is drawn from real life, Murray said.

What the writers win

Each of the five shortlisted writers receives £1,000. The winner, announced at Brunel on 18 November, takes £3,000 in total, a scholarship for an MA in Creative Writing at Brunel and an introductory meeting with a literary agent. The prize was launched in 2025; the first winner was Erwin Joyce Canlubo, a 19-year-old student, for We Don’t Say I Love You In This House, according to the prize page.

Murray said: “We were deeply impressed to discover work of such depth and achievement from individuals at the start of their writing careers.”

The shortlisted stories, he said, “tackle love and loneliness, family and war, themes that are age-old and also utterly contemporary. At a time when reading is under attack from many sides, it’s uplifting to meet new writers with so much passion for their art, writing about our world with honesty and courage.”

Professor Andrew Jones, Brunel’s Vice-Chancellor and President, said: “A love of literature is at the very heart of our cultural life at Brunel University of London. Our partnership with Caffè Nero was formed with an uncomplicated but incredibly meaningful aim: to celebrate the craft of great writing and the joy of reading.”

He added: “We would also like to especially commend Rowan Reddington on his incredible achievement of winning the inaugural Brunel Prize. We look forward to welcoming everyone to Brunel for a fantastic celebration in November at the Award ceremony.”

Gerry Ford, founder and chief executive of Caffè Nero, which launched the Nero Book Awards in 2023, said the prize goes “one step further to seek out and support the future stars of the writing world.”

More on the prize and the judges is on the Nero Book Awards site.