AN OXFORDSHIRE bookseller is one of the people behind a new Book of the Year award.

Independent bookshop customers are being invited to vote for their favourite book in the inaugural award, organised by the Booksellers Association.

Patrick Neale, co-owner of Jaffé and Neale Bookshop and Café in Chipping Norton, is part of the independent booksellers' group, the Small Business Forum, which thought up the idea.

Customers will be invited to vote on shortlists of ten adults and ten children's books. The lists include Oxford professor Richard Dawkins's defence of atheism, The God Delusion, and Ian McEwan's On Chesil Beach, set in Dorset and Oxfordshire.

Mr Neale said: "Voting always gives people an opportunity to express their opinion and it's another way to recommend great books, which we love doing every day at our bookshop and café."

People can vote until December 10 by picking up a postcard from Jaffé and Neale, or by emailing their choice to votes@booksellers.org.uk