Gaelle Belem’s novel There’s A Monster Behind The Door won the Republic of Consciousness Prize for Small Presses 2025 on Tuesday, April 1, 2025.
The Republic of Consciousness Prize for Small Presses is an annual British literary prize founded by the author Neil Griffiths. It rewards fiction published by UK and Irish small presses, defined as those with fewer than five full-time employees. The prize first handed out in 2017 has been won by, among others, John Keene, Eley Williams, Will Eaves, Jean-Baptiste Del Amo, Norman Erikson Pasaribu, Shola von Reinhold, and Missouri Williams. Ana Paula Maia won the award in 2024.
The jury for 2025 is comprised of award-winning writer Alice Jolly, editor and book reviewer Houman Barekat, and novelist, editor, and playwright Jude Cook. Their shortlist featured Invisible Dogs by Charles Boyle, published by CB Editions; How to Leave the World by Marouane Bakhti, translated by Lara Vergnaud and published by Divided Publishing; Célina by Catherine Axelrad, translated by Philip Terry, published by Les Fugitives; and Mother Naked by Glen James Brown, published by Peninsula Press, and There’s A Monster Behind The Door by Gaelle Belem.
The winner was declared to be There’s a Monster Behind the Door by Gaëlle Bélem translated from French by Karen Fleetwood and Laëtitia Saint-Loubert from Irish publisher Bullaun Press.
Gaelle Belem said after the announcement, “I am the winner of the Republic of Consciousness Prize for Small Presses, the prize for which I had gone to London to defend my little monster less than three weeks ago. My first foreign award! And my first appearance in the Guardian! Oh, amazement, oh joy! To you, dear members of the jury, Alice Jolly, Houman Barekat, Jude Cook, I offer my most enthusiastic thanks! Thank you for defending and promoting small publishing houses, like Bullaun Press. Thank you for understanding and loving my little Creole monster! It is the cracked, dented, but palpitating heart of Reunion Island that beats in this text. My congratulations to my publishing house, Bullaun, and its director, Bridget! To Laëtitia and Karen, my wonderful translators, I renew my admiration and gratitude. Bravo! What a team we have! To my readers everywhere, I thank you for your tremendous kindness and support. The jury has decided. We did it!”
There’s a Monster Behind the Door by Gaëlle Bélem comes with the following blurb;
The name Dessaintes is one to reckon with. A bombastic, violent and increasingly dangerous clan, little do they know that their downfall is being chronicled by one of their own.
This is La Réunion in the 1980s: high unemployment and low expectations, the legacy of postcolonialism. One little girl makes a bid for escape from her sadistic parents’ reign of terror and turns to school for salvation.
Rich in the history of the island’s customs and superstitions, and driven by a wild, offbeat humour, this picaresque tale manages to satirize the very notion of freedom available in this French territory, and perhaps even the act of writing itself and where it might lead you.
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