Here are the 13 longlisted books for this year’s Man Booker Prize:
Julian Barnes The Sense of an Ending (Jonathan Cape – Random House)
Sebastian Barry On Canaan’s Side (Faber)
Carol Birch Jamrach’s Menagerie (Canongate Books)
Patrick deWitt The Sisters Brothers (Granta)
Esi Edugyan Half Blood Blues (Serpent’s Tail – Profile)
Yvvette Edwards A Cupboard Full of Coats (Oneworld)
Alan Hollinghurst The Stranger’s Child (Picador – Pan Macmillan)
Stephen Kelman Pigeon English (Bloomsbury)
Patrick McGuinness The Last Hundred Days (Seren Books)
A.D. Miller Snowdrops (Atlantic)
Alison Pick Far to Go (Headline Review)
Jane Rogers The Testament of Jessie Lamb (Sandstone Press)
D.J. Taylor Derby Day (Chatto & Windus – Random House)
I haven’t read enough of them to comment on likely winners, but I’ve got a few months left so will aim to get through a few of them. Will probably start with The Sense of an Ending by Julian Barnes, which I feel less guilty about not having read because it’s not even out yet. How about you? Any recommendations? Are you planning to read any of them before the prize is announced? Are you going to go all out and read all of them? Let me know.
[Edit: just came across this fabulous list of recent prizes and shortlists by book blogger Kinna. There’s a lot more out there than just the Booker!]
Update: I’ve now reviewed two of the books on this list: The Sense of an Ending and Half Blood Blues. I also wrote an analysis of The Sense of an Ending, which has been my most popular post on the blog.
There are 8 comments
Interesting longlist, Andrew! Nice to see Alan Hollinghurst there – he publishes a book only once in a few years and his last book won the Booker. It will be interesting to see how his new book does here. I haven’t heard of most of the other writers (other than Julian Barnes and Sebastian Barry). Esi Edugyan looks like a Turkish name 🙂 I would love to read some of these books before the prize is announced.
I forgot to mention one more thing. Thanks for giving the link to Kinna’s post on literary awards. The list she has compiled is really wonderful!
Yes, there are quite a few unfamiliar names on there for me too, which is quite refreshing. I never read Hollinghurst’s last book, so maybe will get around to this one. I liked the look of Esi Edugyan’s book Half Blood Blues, so think I will read that as well. You’re right, it does sound Turkish, but I looked her up and she’s of African ancestry, brought up in Canada 🙂 Kinna’s list is great, isn’t it? Amazing how many awards there are!
Thanks for that link to Kinna’s post. There is more than the Booker, I agree, still it is always interesting to see that list too.
I have not read any of these. I googled most of them an a lot of them sound interesting.
Hi Caroline, you’re welcome! I thought it was fascinating, and must have taken a lot of work by Kinna to put it together, so glad you found it helpful.
Hi Celawerd, yes, a lot do sound interesting. As well as the Julian Barnes book I mentioned in the post, I also liked the look of Pigeon English, The Testament of Jessie Lamb, Half Blood Blues and The Last Hundred Days.
There are lots of new names here, at least to me. Can’t bet on any at this time until the shortlist is out. Esi Edugyan is a Ghanaian know, just to let you know.
Thanks for letting me know about Esi Edugyan. Her book sounds interesting – I think I’ll read it some time before the prize is announced. You’re right, it’s hard to place bets at this stage. When the shortlist is announced it gets easier to guess where things are going, but even then I’m usually wrong!