Rosanna Pike won the 2025 Bollinger Everyman Prize for Comic Fiction and Marina Lewycka was awarded the Vintage Bollinger Prize, selected from past winners.

By Erin L. Cox, Publisher | @erinlcox

Last night, the Bollinger Everyman Wodehouse Prize for Comic Fiction awarded not one but two prizes at an award ceremony at One Great George Street, Westminster, in Central London.

The prize, which is celebrating its 25th year, is given each year to the funniest novels published in the United Kingdom that year. This year’s winners are Rosanna Pike, who was awarded the 2025 Bollinger Everyman Prize for Comic Fiction for her debut novel A Little Trickerie, and Marina Lewycka who was awarded the Vintage Bollinger Prize for her international bestselling book A Short History of Tractors in Ukrainian.

The Vintage Bollinger Prize was the ‘Winner of Winners’ from the twenty-five previous recipients of the award. Peter Florence, Chair of the Judges and Director of The Conversation at St Martin-in-the-Fields, noted, “Judging the Vintage Bollinger Prize was always going to be a locked-in hoot as we revisited so many fabulously funny winners. It seemed a daunting idea to garland one book among so many as the funniest book of the last 25 years, but actually we came to a book that some people were discovering for the first time and were laughing aloud at and loving.

“She has us at the title, and she rocks us on every page. And it’s a book that is reshaped by the 20 years since it was first published, by both the history of Ukraine and the story of refugee experience in the UK. The comedy is somehow both darker and more vivid. Marina died on the day after the jury met to decide the prize winner. I am so glad to know that she knew she had won.”

For the Bollinger Everyman Prize for Comic Fiction, Pike received a jeroboam as well as a case of Bollinger Special Cuvée, the complete set of the Everyman’s Library P.G. Wodehouse collection, and a pig named after her winning book. On winning this year’s prize, Pike said: “I was over the moon to get the news and completely surprised. This is such a special and unique prize and the past shortlistees and winners are just incredible. I am so honored that the judges thought my writing amusing enough to make the shortlist, let alone win. And the best part – there is now a pig snuffling around named ‘A Little Trickerie.’ What more could a debut novelist ask for?”

The novel was inspired by a true story and is an original and irreverent tale of belief and superstition, kinship and courage, set in 16th century England, with an unforgettable and distinctly unangelic heroine. Since its publication in June, the book has become an instant bestseller and received countless glowing reviews, including from our friends at The Bookseller, which selected it for an Editor’s Choice. They said of the book “I defy you to resist the raw energy and subversive humour of this Tudor picaresque novel narrated by foul-mouthed, big-hearted Tibb … evoking a Tudor England a far cry from the usual image of courtly banquets.”

For more details about the Bollinger Everyman Wodehouse Prize for Comic Fiction, including a list of all previous winners, visit the website here.