"The award comes after Ni d'Eve Ni d'Adam dropped out of contention for both the Goncourt and the Renaudot prizes, awarded earlier this week to Gilles Leroy and Daniel Pennac, decisions which sparked a revolt in the French literary blogosphere.

Faced with what he called the "terrible mediocrity" of this autumn's literary prizes, this Monday the publisher Leo Scheer "solemnly" called for a revolution. He suggested organising a "plan B (for blogosphere)", awarding a set of competing prizes - the Goncourt B, the Renaudot B - to mirror and counter the "depressing" awards in the real world.

His suggestion to add yet another set of prizes to the congested French literary calendar was to some extent "playful", he told the French newspaper 20minutes, but he was trying to make a serious point.

"Many people only buy one book a year," he said, "often following the recommendations of the Goncourt jury.""

wrote Richard Lea in the Guardian yesterday.