Annal:1985 Whitbread Book Award for First Novel
From AwardAnnals
Results of the Whitbread Book Award in the year 1985. For a ranked list of books, try an honor roll:
Oranges Are Not the Only Fruit
- 1985 Whitbread-1st Novel winner
- Score: 10.35
Jeanette is a bright and rebellious orphan who is adopted into an evangelical household in the dour, industrial North of England and finds herself embroidering grim religious mottoes and shaking her little tambourine for Jesus. But as this budding missionary comes of age, and comes to terms with her unorthodox sexuality, the peculiar balance of her God-fearing household dissolves. Jeanette’s insistence on listening to the truths of her own heart and mind—and on reporting them with wit and passion—makes for an unforgettable chronicle of an eccentric, moving passage into adulthood.
