PHILIP Pullman and his Oxford publisher are leading the nominations for this year's British Book Awards.

The Oxford author's latest novel, La Belle Sauvage, is topping the shorlist for the best children's book and best audibook.

His long-time editor David Fickling, who has offices in Beaumont Street, is also nominated for this year's Editor of the Year.

In the children's book category Mr Pullman, who lives in Cumnor, is up against comedian David Walliams's Bad Dad and four other titles for the award.

Oxford Mail:

In the audiobook race he faces competition from another comedian, Robert Webb, who read his own autobiography How To Be a Boy, as well as Stephen Fry reading a new collection of Sherlock Holmes stories.

Winners in the awards, run by The Bookseller magazine, will be announced at a ceremony on Monday, May 14.

Despite being published in October last year, La Belle Sauvage still became the tenth-bestselling book of 2017, shifting 261,000 copies.

The novel has been promised as the first in a trilogy which will be a prequel to Mr Pullman's bestselling His Dark Materials trilogy which is largely set in Oxford.