Bad Sex in Fiction Award 2015: Morrissey’s debut novel List of the Lost leads nominations

Morrissey’s novel List of the Lost has been nominated for a Bad Sex in Fiction Award.

The musician’s debut novel, which was met with harsh criticism when it was released earlier this year, has been recognised in The Literary Review’s annual honours.

Each year, the awards honour the “most egregious passage of sexual description in a work of fiction", with previous nominees including AA Gill and Alistair Campbell.

A statement from the magazine read: “Morrissey's sex scene is an astonishing bid by a first time novelist for this year's Literary Review Bad Bad Sex In Fiction Award.

“It's convoluted, overwrought and profoundly unsexy. The List Of The Lost could have done with less of lust."

Morrissey responded to bad reviews earlier this month, hinting that some of them were a ‘personal attack’ on him.

Speaking to Chile's Cooperativa website, he said: “I strongly believe in freedom of expression and critics have to say what they have to say.

“But often the criticisms are an attack against me as a human being and have nothing to do with what they’re reading.”

Outlining the plot of the novel ahead of its release, Morrissey wrote on his website:

“The theme is demonology ... the left-handed path of black magic.

“It is about a sports relay team in 1970s America who accidentally kill a wretch who, in esoteric language, might be known as a Fetch ... a discarnate entity in physical form.”