Polari First Book Prize
The Polari First Book Prize is an award for a first book which explores the LGBT experience and is open to selected works of poetry, prose, fiction or non-fiction published in the UK in English within the twelve months of the deadline for submission. It runs alongside the main Polari Book Prize each year.
In 2025 some of the long-listed authors for the Polari Book Prize objected to a book listed for the main prize by John Boyne, an Irish writer, because he has gender-critical views. [1] The Polari Prize organisers then decided to cancel the whole event in 2025 [2]