Robinson takes Orange Prize Home

The Orange Prize for female literature has been won by American author Marilynne Robinson for her book Home - just her third novel in 28 years.

The all-woman judging panel, headed by broadcaster Fi Glover, did not deliberate for long before coming to a unanimous decision. Glover revealed that each of the five judges had selected Home as one of their top two books.

The story is described as a beautifully crafted exploration of family relationships and redemption and takes place in the same small 1950s Iowa prairie town as her last novel, Gilead, which was awarded a Pulitzer prize five years ago.

Robinson is a devout Christian and both Home and Gilead are retellings of the story of the Biblical parable of the prodigal son. After winning the prize - and a cheque for £30,000 - at the Royal Festival Hall in London, Robinson said fiction could help people "step back" from material obsessions to re-assess "what is to be valued in life". 

Despite her minimal output Robinson is regarded as one of the great living authors. Her first book, Housekeeping, was published in 1980, and became a sleeper hit which is now regarded as a modern classic. In between her last two novels Robinson published a polemic about the British nuclear industry and a book of essays on unfashionable subjects including theology and Calvinism.

Jonathan Ruppin of Foyles ladled out the praise: "Robinson is simply one of the outstanding prose stylists of recent years," he opined. "She will undoubtedly come to be seen as essential as Nabokov or Conrad. In picking this book as this year's winner, the judges have made a real statement about the lyrical power of fiction, beyond its basic function to tell stories." ·