This year's category judges are:

Whitbread Novel Award
Esther Freud (Author)
Mary Loudon (Author and book critic, The Times)
Tim O'Kelly (One Tree Bookshop, Petersfield)

Whitbread First Novel Award
Brian Case (Literary Editor, Time Out)
Giles Foden (Author and reviewer)
Jane Rogers (Author)

Whitbread Biography Award
Mike Brookes-Sullivan (Borders UK)
Kathryn Hughes (Biographer and Critic)
Stella Tillyard (Writer)

Whitbread Poetry Award
Harry Eyres (Journalist)
Daisy Goodwin (Head of Features, Talkback Productions)
Tobias Hill (Poet and Novelist)

Whitbread Children's Book of the Year
Julia Eccleshare (Journalist)
Roy Flowers (Kendrake Children's Bookshop, Sutton)
Jamila Gavin (Author)
Lizo Mzimba (Newsround presenter)

Young Judges Annalisa Middleton, age 13 and Harry Cheetham, age 11, selected from a Presspackers competition run on CBBC Newsround.

Final judges
The final judges select the winner of the Whitbread Children's Book of the Year and the Whitbread Book of the Year.

This year, Channel 4 broadcaster and journalist, Jon Snow, will chair the final judging panel. Joining Jon are actress Saffron Burrows (Enigma), writer and comedian Sanjeev Bhaskar (Goodness Gracious Me), Olympic gold medallist Denise Lewis and authors Esther Freud, Tobias Hill, Jamila Gavin, Stella Tillyard and Giles Foden, each representing their category judging panel. The panel will meet on Tuesday 22nd January 2002 to select the winners of both awards, worth £30,000 in total, which will be announced at a ceremony later that evening.

FINAL JUDGES