Super Furry Animals's Gruff Rhys on book award shortlist

Gruff Rhys has toured with the album of the story in America and the UK

Super Furry Animals' front man Gruff Rhys has been nominated for the Wales Book of the Year award.

As he prepares for a weekend of sell-out comeback shows with his band in Cardiff, Rhys has made the shortlist for American Interior.

The book - which was also a film, album and a live tour - tells of his ancestor John Evans's search for a tribe of Welsh-speaking native Americans.

The winner will be announced next month.

Rhys tells the story of Evans, a Snowdonia farm labourer who left for America in 1792 to search of the mythical Madogwys tribe.

Nominated for the poetry award is Jonathan Edwards, who has already won the Costa Poetry Award last year for My Family and Other Superheroes.

He is among 11 of the 18 authors on the English and Welsh-language shortlists who are there for the first time.

Others include Horatio Clare, who was a "writer in residence" on a freight ship to produce Down to the Sea in Ships.

Patrick McGuiness recalls his childhood in Belgium in Other People's Countries.

Carys Davies is nominated for her series of short stories set around the world, while Cynan Jones's short novel is set in rural Wales on a farm.

The nine authors nominated for the three English language awards

Fiction Short List

The Redemption of Galen Pike, Carys Davies

The Dig, Cynan Jones

Burrard Inlet, Tyler Keevil

Creative Non-Fiction Short List

Down to the Sea in Ships, Horatio Clare

Other People's Countries, Patrick McGuinness

American Interior, Gruff Rhys

The Roland Mathias Poetry Award Short List

Telling Tales, Patience Agbabi

So Many Moving Parts, Tiffany Atkinson

My Family and Other Superheroes, Jonathan Edwards

The nominations in full

The judges for the English-language titles are journalist and literary critic Alex Clark, author Tessa Hadley and poet Paul Henry.

Lleucu Siencyn, chief executive of Literature Wales said: "The shortlisted authors take us on many journeys - to faraway lands, to various locations across Wales, and into the minds of characters both likeable and loathsome."

Welsh language shortlist:

Poetry:

Un Stribedyn Bach, Rhys Iorwerth

Storm ar Wyneb yr Haul, Llŷr Gwyn Lewis

Wilia, Meic Stephens

Fiction Short List

Awst yn Anogia, Gareth F. Williams

Saith Oes Efa, Lleucu Roberts

Y Fro Dywyll, Jerry Hunter

Creative Non-Fiction Short List

Rhyw Flodau Rhyfel, Llŷr Gwyn Lewis

100 o Olygfeydd Hynod Cymru, Dyfed Elis-Gruffydd

Mwy na Bardd, Kate Crockett