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Today the Man Booker Prize shortlist was announced. Here they are:
- Julian Barnes: The Sense of an Ending
- Carol Birch: Jamrach’s Menagerie
- Patrick deWitt: The Sisters Brothers
- Esi Edugyan: Half Blood Blues
- Stephen Kelman: Pigeon English
- AD Miller: Snowdrops
I have read The Sisters Brothers (review here) and Snowdrops (review here). I also started Jamrach’s Menagerie but abandoned it early on. I believe I will give it another go now that it is on the shortlist. And since the Kelman is a book I’ve avoided all year, perhaps now is the time to read it too. I anxiously await a copy of The Sense of an Ending, and believe that right now it is the front runner on the Man Booker forum (here).
Honestly, I’ve been disenchanted with the Booker this year. Many of the longlisted books were simply not good. Still, it appears that from that longlist, the judges have come up with an interesting shortlist — at least, I know people who have enjoyed each of these books quite a bit — perhaps the fact that each is on the shortlist is defensible. The Barry and the Holinghurst didn’t make it, which will upset many, but the Barnes did, which makes me happy (I abandoned the Holinghurst and wasn’t really looking forward to the Barry, though I’ll probably still read it, someday, maybe). I believe the best book from the longlist I read so far was Alison Pick’s Far to Go (my review here), but while I think it was great, I can understand why it didn’t make it.
The winner will be announced on October 18.
I love this time of year! The Man Booker Prize longlist is as follows (dates in parentheses indicate when the title is slated for publication in the United States if it is not already available):
- The Sense of an Ending, Julian Barnes (January 24, 2012)
- On Canaan’s Side, Sebastian Barry (September 8, 2011)
- Jamrach’s Menagerie, Carol Birch
- The Sisters Brothers, Patrick deWitt
- Half Blood Blues, Esi Edugyan (I don’t see a date for this one)
- A Cupboard Full of Coats, Yvvette Edwards
- The Stranger’s Child, Alan Holinghurst (October 11, 2011)
- Pigeon English, Stephen Kelman
- The Last Hundred Days, Patrick McGuinness (I don’t see a date for this one)
- Snowdrops, A.D. Miller
- Far to Go, Alison Pick
- The Testament of Jessie Lamb, Jane Rogers (I don’t see a date for this one)
- Derby Day, D.J. Taylor (I don’t see a date for this one)
So, six of the titles are already available in the U.S., a couple more due out before the winner is announced, and four that may never make it here, which is basically right in line with past years. We’ll have to see if the longlist gets any of the other titles a U.S. publication. Last year, my two favorites (Damon Galgut’s In a Strange Room (review here), and Howard Jacobson’s The Finkler Question (review here)) were not available in the U.S. when the longlist was announced but were soon offered as ebooks, which is how I read them, and eventually were published in paperback.
I haven’t read any of the books on this year’s longlist, though I do have copies of The Sisters Brothers and The Stranger’s Child, both of which I’ve been meaning to read, mostly in anticipation of this list. I’ve heard a lot about On Canaan’s Side, Pigeon English and Snowdrops, but I’ll have to revisit to see if I want to read them. I felt let down with Barry’s last Booker contender, The Secret Scripture (my review here) but I liked it enough that I may give this one a go. KevinfromCanada reviewed Far to Go earlier this year (KFC review here), and I have it marked as one I’d like to get to. I have a soft spot for Julian Barnes, and this short novel sounds excellent to me.
Some exclusions of past winners: Aravind Adiga’s Last Man in the Tower, Michael Ondaatje’s Cat’s Table, Graham Swift’s Wish You Were Here, Barry Unsworth’s The Quality of Mercy, and Anne Enright’s The Forgotten Waltz. There are also some past strong shortlisters whose exclusion may surprise some: Ali Smith’s There but for the, Edward St. Aubyn’s At Last, Hisham Matar’s Anatomy of a Disappearance, Linda Grant’s We Had It So Good, and Philip Hensher’s King of the Badgers. I thought perhaps David Bezmozgis’s The Free World would find its way there (I’ve read this one but haven’t reviewed it yet — soon).
The general breakdown (which I got from the Man Booker Prize website’s official write-up (here)), is one former winner (Holinghurst), two previous shortlisters (Barnes and Barry), and one previous longlister (Birch). There are four first time novelists (Kelman, Miller, Edwards, and McGuinness) and three Canadians writers on the list (deWitt, Edugyan, and Pick).
The shortlist will be announced September 6. The winner on October 18.
Other than that, I’m anxious to see how this year stacks up. I’m not particularly thrilled about any of the titles, but that hopefully will change.
After winning the National Book Award in 2009, Colum McCann’s Let the Great World Spin has now won the IMPAC (see the announcement on the IMPAC website here).
I have this book on hand, but I haven’t been compelled to read it quite yet. Perhaps this will do the trick.
Congratulations to Téa Obreht whose debut novel The Tiger’s Wife won the Orange Prize today, making her the youngest winner in the prize’s history (she’s the 15th winner). I didn’t particularly like the book as a whole, though I do think Obreht is a fine writer. Certainly we’ll be hearing her name again (I’m hoping her best work is still ahead of her).
Philip Roth has won the 2011 Man Booker International (click here for the announcement on the Man Booker Prize website, which also has a recording of his acceptance speech). With sixteen reviews so far, Roth is by far the most reviewd author on this blog, and he’s likely to remain so indefinitely since I can’t think of another author I’m likely to read who has as much work. Perhaps some day I’ll start reading the complete works of Joyce Carol Oates. At any rate, congratulations to Philip Roth, a most deserving author, even if he doesn’t need the money.
The 2011 Best Translated Book Award winners were announced tonight.
Fiction: The True Deceiver, by Tove Jansson, translated from the Swedish by Thomas Teal
Poetry: The Book of Things, by Aleš Šteger, translated from the Slovenian by Brian Henry
Excellent! And this is the first year the winners get some prize money, $5,000 for each author and $5,000 for each translator (I’m not sure what they do if the author is deceased). I have had The True Deceiver for over a year and will pull it down as soon as possible.
The 2011 winner of the Pulitzer Prize for Fiction is:
- A Visit from the Goon Squad, by Jennifer Egan
The two other finalists are:
- The Privileges, by Jonathan Dee
- The Surrendered, by Chang-rae Lee
If you have read my review of Egan’s A Visit from the Goon Squad (linked to above), you know that I fully endorse this year’s decision. A part of me, though, likes to rush out and buy the Pulitzer winner upon hearing it, which I don’t get to do this year.
And in more prize news, the 2011 IMPAC Dublin Award shortlist has been announced. I’ve read two (the ones with links below).
- Galore, by Michael Crummey
- The Lacuna, by Barbara Kingsolver
- The Vagrants, by Yiyun Li
- Ransom, by David Malouf
- Let the Great World Spin, by Colum McCann
- Little Bird of Heaven, by Joyce Carol Oates
- Jasper Jones, by Craig Silvey
- Brooklyn, by Colm Tóibín
- Love and Summer, by William Trevor
- After the Fire, a Still, Small Voice, by Evie Wyld
For the first time since I started following the prize, there are no books in translation, which is a shame. Also noteworthy is the inclusion of three Irish writers and three Australian writers. However, I’m all for their inclusion. For fun, Malouf won the award in 1996 for Remembering Babylon and Tóibín won in 2006 for The Master.
Of the two I’ve read, I greatly preferred Brooklyn. I have and am looking forward to Love and Summer, and I have but am not particularly looking forward to Let the Great World Spin. I’m not particularly interested in The Lacuna, though I do like some of Kingsolver’s other work.
Here are the finalists for the 2011 Orange Prize. Surprisingly, I’ve already read two of the six (the ones with links below). I’ve read an exceprt from The Tiger’s Wife and wasn’t a fan, though I note that many many many people are praising it. I have no interest in reading Room or The Memory of Love, and know little about Grace Williams Says It Loud.
- Room, by Emma Donoghue
- The Memory of Love, by Aminatta Forna
- Grace Williams Says It Loud, by Emma Henderson
- Great House, by Nicole Krauss
- The Tiger’s Wife, by Téa Obreht
- Annabel, by Kathleen Winter
Of the two I read, I think I liked Annabel more as a story, but I think Great House touched deeper and was written better, if not to great cumulative effect. I suppose, then, that I’m rather indifferent to the prize this year.
The ten fiction finalists for the Best Translated Book Award have been announced
- Agaat by Marlene Van Niekerk, tr. from the Afrikaans by Michiel Heyns
- Georg Letham: Physician and Murderer by Ernst Weiss, tr. from the German by Joel Rotenberg
- The Golden Age by Michal Ajvaz, tr. from the Czech by Andrew Oakland
- Hocus Bogus by Romain Gary (writing as Émile Ajar), tr. from the French by David Bellos
- The Jokers by Albert Cossery, tr. from the French by Anna Moschovakis
- A Life on Paper by George-Olivier Châteaureynaud, tr. from the French by Edward Gauvin
- The Literary Conference by César Aira, tr. from the Spanish by Katherine Silver
- On Elegance While Sleeping by “Viscount” Lascano Tegui, tr. from the Spanish by Idra Novey
- The True Deceiver by Tove Jansson, tr. from the Swedish by Thomas Teal
- Visitation by Jenny Erpenbeck, tr. from the German by Susan Bernofsky
I have read only three of the finalists and reviewed only two (the highlighted ones above, with links to my reviews; I will soon have a review of A Life on Paper up). Of the longlisters I read, I’m not surprised A Jew Must Die is not on this list (though it is certainly worth reading), but I did really like Bad Nature, or With Elvis in Mexico.
By any measure, these are fine books. I have four on my shelf to read, and I’m looking forward to each.
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