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
Arthur C. Newby Arthur C. Newby Arthur Calvin Newby (December 29, 1865—September 11, 1933) was a pioneer of the bicycle and automotive industry in Indianapolis, Indiana and one of the four founders of the Indianapolis Speedway with Carl G. Fisher, James A. Allison and Frank H. Wheeler. He was born near Monrovia, Indiana but his family moved to Kansas City then California. Newby came back to Indiana and Indianapolis in his late teens and worked his way up to head bookkeeper at milling machinery manufacturer, Nordyke Marmon & Company. A keen cyclist he set up the Zig-Zag Bicycling Club and remained its secretary