Andrea sadly died in February 2019.
Andrea Levy was a Londoner, who not only lived and worked in the city she loved but used London as the setting in many of her novels. She has been a recipient of an Arts Council Award and her second novel Never Far from Nowhere was long listed for the Orange Prize. Besides novels she has also written short stories that have been read on radio, published in newspapers and anthologised. She has been a judge for the Orange Prize for Fiction, Orange Futures and the Saga Prize.
Her novel Small Island was the winner of the Orange Prize for Fiction, the Whitbread Novel Award, the Orange Best of the Best, and the Commonwealth Writer’s Prize. In 2009, it was adapted into a two-part TV drama for BBC One, starring Naomi Harris, Benedict Cumberbatch, Ruth Wilson and David Oyelowo. The National Theatre production, adapted by Helen Edmondson, first opened in April 2019 and returned to the Olivier stage in October 2020 for a second run.
This adaptation of Small Island was revived in 2026. A Leeds Playhouse, Birmingham Rep and Nottingham Playhouse production, in association with Actors Touring Company, directed by Matthew Xia, took audiences on a journey from the sun-drenched shores of Jamaica to the cold, grey streets of 1940s London. The production premiered at Leeds Playhouse on 11 – 28 March before transferring to Birmingham Rep on 1 – 18 April, and Nottingham Playhouse on 28 April – 16 May 2026.
Her last novel The Long Song was shortlisted for The Man Booker Prize 2010 and won the Walter Scott prize for historical fiction. It was optioned by Heyday and the television adaptation by Sarah Williams tx’d in December 2018. The stage version, adapted by Suhayla El-Bushra, opened at Chichester Festival Theatre 1 – 23 October 2021.
We represent the film, television and stage rights to Andrea’s work. Her published work is represented by David Grossman Associates.