BY NIGHT she worked as a waitress in a restaurant in London; by day she struggled to write her first novel. Yesterday that book was shortlisted for one of the country’s big literary awards.

Rachel Zadok has been nominated for the £25,000 Whitbread Book Awards, alongside such established writers as Nick Hornby, Salman Rushdie and Geraldine McCaughrean.

Zadok, 33, trained as a graphic designer and started writing only four years ago, when she came from Johannesburg to live in London with her husband, a doctor. Working as a waitress in a restaurant-bar in Herne Hill, South London, enabled her to write.

She found a publisher after she watched Channel 4’s Richard & Judy show and heard them announce a literary competition.

She recalled: “I’m very superstitious. The day I found out about the competition I was having a really bad day writing. The book was at a difficult point. Eventually I gave up and did something I think is death to anyone who works from home: I turned on the TV.

“Richard and Judy were on and they were announcing the ‘How to get published’ competition. To someone as superstitious as me, that’s a sign, so I took down the details and sent something off.”

She submitted a sample chapter, as did 46,000 other hopefuls, and found herself among five finalists. Although she did not win, her writing so impressed Pan Macmillan that it took on the novel.

Gem Squash Tokoloshe, about a young girl growing up during the height of apartheid unrest in South Africa, has now been recognised by the Whitbread judges for its “lithe and imaginative” prose and its powerful evocation of a child’s-eye view of rural South Africa.

Hearing the news, Zadok said: “I’m absolutely amazed.”

The Whitbread Awards, which were instituted in 1971, have five categories: Novel, First Novel, Biography, Poetry, and Children’s Book. They recognise “the most enjoyable books of last year” by writers based in Britain and Ireland.

The category winners, who each receive £5,000, will be announced on January 4. The winner of the £25,000 Book of the Year will be announced on January 24. The judges include the broadcaster John Humphrys, the author Margaret Drabble and the comedy writer and performer Arabella Weir.

Rushdie has been chosen this time for Shalimar The Clown, although it failed to make it from the Man Booker Prize’s longlist to the shortlist earlier this year.

Other shortlisted books include Alexander Masters’s Stuart: A Life Backwards, the life story of a drifter the author met while working at a Cambridge day centre for the homeless.

NOVEL AWARD

Nick Hornby A Long Way Down — Viking Salman Rushdie Shalimar The Clown — Jonathan Cape Ali Smith The Accidental — Hamish Hamilton Christopher Wilson The Ballad of Lee Cotton — Little, Brown

FIRST NOVEL AWARD

Tash Aw The Harmony Silk Factory — Harper Perennial Diana Evans 26a — Chatto & Windus Peter Hobbs The Short Day Dying — Faber and Faber Rachel Zadok Gem Squash Tokoloshe — Pan Macmillan

BIOGRAPHY AWARD

Nigel Farndale Haw-Haw — Macmillan Richard Mabey Nature Cure — Chatto & Windus Alexander Masters Stuart A Life Backwards — Fourth Estate Hilary Spurling Matisse The Master — Hamish Hamilton

POETRY AWARD

David Harsent Legion — Faber and Faber Christopher Logue Cold Calls —- Faber and Faber Richard Price Lucky Day — Carcanet Jane Yeh Marabou — Carcanet

CHILDREN’S BOOK AWARD

Frank Cottrell Boyce Framed — Macmillan Geraldine McCaughrean The White Darkness — Oxford University Press Hilary McKay Permanent Rose — Hodder Headline Kate Thompson The New Policeman — The Bodley Head

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