What Was Lost Was Lost" was the winner in the first novel category of the Costa Book Awards. O'Flynn received a £5,000 prize. It was short-listed for the overall Costa Book of the Year Award. The Costa Book Awards' judging panel, chaired by Joanna Trollope, praised the novel for "blending humour and pathos in a cleverly constructed and absorbing mystery." They described the novel as inventive, compelling, and poignant. "What Was Lost" was long-listed for the 2007 Man Booker Prize and the Orange Prize for Fiction. It was short-listed for the Guardian First Book Award. It won the Jelf Group First Novel Award
P. H. Newby unit was one of the last to be evacuated. Afterwards he was sent to the Middle East and served in the Egyptian desert. Newby was released from military service in December 1942, and then taught English Literature at King Fouad University in Cairo until 1946. One of his students was the Egyptian editor Mursi Saad El-Din. From 1949 to 1978 he was employed by the BBC, beginning as a radio producer and going on to become successively Controller of the Third Programme and Radio Three, Director of Programmes (Radio), and finally Managing Director, BBC Radio. While at Radio 3, Newby