Malala Yousafzai, the schoolgirl who was shot in the head by the Taliban for speaking up for education and women’s rights, has now become an award-winning author.
The 16-year-old and journalist Christina Lamb won the Magic FM Non-fiction Book of the Year prize for her memoir I Am Malala at the Specsavers National Book Awards 2013.
The Taliban’s assassination attempt took place while the schoolgirl was on a school bus in Pakistan in October 2012.
Malala, whose views made her a Taliban target, has spoken of how her beloved home in Pakistan’s Swat Valley region was taken over by the “terrorists” who stopped her and her female friends going to school.
The young activist, who now lives in Britain, collected her prize at a ceremony at London’s Mandarin Oriental.
Comedy favourites Sir David Jason and David Walliams also took home prizes from the awards, which are billed as a celebration of Britain’s best books.
Sir David, one of Britain’s best-loved actors for his roles in Only Fools and Horses and Open All Hours, won Biography of the Year for his book David Jason: My Life while a tale called Demon Dentist by Walliams saw him win the Children’s Book of the Year for the second year running. Last year he won with Ratburger.
Cook Nigel Slater also tasted glory, bagging the Food and Drink Book of the Year award for Eat.
Gillian Flynn, whose Gone Girl was the star of the summer book charts, pipped a host of best-selling authors including Man Booker winner Eleanor Catton to the award for International Author of the Year.
The winners now compete in an online public vote for the prestigious Book of the Year award ... revealed on Boxing Day
Robert Harris’s An Officer and a Spy took the Popular Fiction Book of the Year award, beating Bridget Jones and Bond. Chart-topping novelists Dawn French, Philippa Gregory and Adele Parks were also toppled by Harris’s gripping retelling of the Dreyfus Affair.
The winners now compete in an online public vote for the prestigious Book of the Year award, and the victor will be revealed on Boxing Day.
List of Winners
Autobiography/Biography of the Year: David Jason: My Life by David Jason (Century)
Popular Fiction Book of the Year: An Officer and a Spy by Robert Harris (Cornerstone)
Crime Book of the Year: The Carrier by Sophie Hannah (Hodder)
Food & Drink Book of the Year: Eat by Nigel Slater (HarperCollins)
International Author of the Year: Gone Girl by Gillian Flynn (Orion)
Non-fiction Book of the Year: I Am Malala by Malala Yousafzai and Christina Lamb (Orion)
UK Author of the Year: Life after Life by Kate Atkinson (Transworld)
Children’s Book of the Year: Demon Dentist by David Walliams (HarperCollins)
Audiobook of the Year: The Ocean at the End of the Lane by Neil Gaiman (Headline)
New Writer of the Year: Tigers in Red Weather by Liza Klaussmann (Picador)