Barbara Kingsolver’s new novel, Demon Copperhead, has been selected as the winner for this year’s Women’s Prize for Fiction, the Guardian reported on Wednesday. Kingsolver now become the first woman in the prize’s 28-year history to win the Prize twice.
The novel is set in the Appalachian Mountains in Virginia0 and is a reimagining of Charles Dickens’ semi-autobiography, David Copperfield.
It follows Demon Copperhead as he navigates “foster care, labour exploitation, addiction, and more in a culture that neglects rural communities,” said The Guardian.
The Women’s Prize for Fiction was first held in 1996, and it was made to award a female author of any nationality for her novels.
Notable winners include The Song of Achilles in 2012, which sold over two million copies worldwide, as well as Maggie O’Farrell’s Hamnet in 2020.