Seascraper (novel)

Seascraper is a 2025 novel by Benjamin Wood. The novel follows Thomas Flett who lives with his mother on the fictional costal town of Longferry in England. Thomas is a seascraper, earning a meagre living by using a horse-drawn cart to trawl for shrimp on the beach. He then sells his daily catch at a local market. At only twenty years old, Thomas must endure this physically demanding work to eke out a living for himself and his mother, but he has dreams of becoming a folk singer. The novel was longlisted for the 2025 Booker Prize. The judges called the novel a "mesmerizing portrait" of a man constrained by his circumstances. It won the Nero Book Award for fiction, with the judges describing it as an "utterly immersive read, steeped in atmosphere, that explores what constitutes a well-lived life".