The Bath Children’s Novel Award 2026 is a £5,000 international prize for children’s novels, YA, chapter books, early readers and picture book texts. The prize is open to unagented writers who are unpublished, self-published or independently published without advance. Submissions are invited from 26 February 2026 to 30 November 2026 and we welcome writers of every age, gender, nationality and residency.
Bath Children’s Laureates include: New York Times bestselling author Struan Murray for the manuscript of Orphans of the Tide (published by Puffin in 2020), Matthew Fox for the manuscript of The Sky Over Rebecca (Hachette, 2022) and Lucy Van Smit for The Hurting (Chicken House, 2018)
