At last, the reason you've been looking for to NEVER care about the Orange Prize again - Lily Allen's on the judging panel.
In what only a recent head trauma victim could bill as a coup, the 22-year-old FR Leavis manque has been drafted in this year to cast her... Jesus, what would you call it? expert eye? ... over a variety of women's fiction, because celebrities haven't wormed their way into enough corners of cultural life already. To be candid, it's a bit like the year when Jerry Hall did the Whitbread. You have to feel Seamus Heaney's victory will always be asterisked.
Anyway, how the organisers ended up in this thoroughly screwed situation becomes slightly clearer following a statement from Orange's head of entertainment and brand marketing.
"It's been an outstanding year for the recently re-branded Orange Broadband Prize for Fiction," Hattie Magee declares. "We remain committed to exploring innovative ways of promoting female fiction through our association with technology and hope to bring their work to a wider audience."
Well done, Hattie!
The winner will scoop £30,000 and the chance to call themselves a Pyrrhic victor across a range of delivery platforms.
