The Booker Prize Long List is out !

17 years ago

And here it is...

Aravind Adiga - The White Tiger

Gaynor Arnold - Girl in a Blue Dress

Sebastian Barry - The Secret Scripture

John Berger - From A to X

Michelle de Kretser - The Lost Dog

Amitav Ghosh - Sea of Poppies

Linda Grant - The Clothes on Their Backs

Mohammed Hanif - A Case of Exploding Mangoes

Philip Hensher - The Northern Clemency

Joseph O'Neill - Netherland

Salman Rushdie - The Enchantress of Florence

Tom Rob Smith - Child 44

Steve Toltz - A Fraction of the Whole

Disappointed not to see Tim Winton's new book "Breath" on there. (Mainly because I bought it already...) But I read and thoroughly enjoyed "The Secret Scripture". I'm not familiar with any of the others.

Short-list on September 7th.

Oh - by the way - some of you might have wondered why I didn't post about the "Booker of Bookers". Well, frankly, I was so disgusted with the short-list (no "Remains of the Day" - no "Possession" - no "Life of Pi") that I couldn't take it seriously. Once they were missing, and flamin' "Midnight's Children" was shortlisted again, it was a cast-iron certainty to be selected. Very disappointing altogether.

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Comments (11)

frances_md
17 years ago
I remember reading some good reviews of Child 44 a few months ago but when I checked further it seemed to be too gruesome for me. I would be interested to hear if any of these books are not depressing. Sea of Poppies sounds good but is not yet available in the US. Girl in a Blue Dress is not released and doesn't even have a synopsis on Amazon yet but the cover looks promising!
carolyn_ky
17 years ago
Martin, glad to hear from you. I was beginning to think you had deserted us and left me to my fate of never knowing what the Booker nominations and winners are. See, I don't have to look them up when you are so kind as to post them here.
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What criteria is used to choose these books? Since reading and loving "The English Patient" (first Booker I ever read), it always caught my attention if a book had a sticker on it -- "Booker Winner" or "Booker Shortlisted". But when I read "God of Small Things" it was such a disappointment! Couldn't understand what that book was trying TO SAY ... and it was obvious that the writer was trying to get SOMETHING across. It was odd, when I returned it to the store, the guy behind the counter said, "You're returning this?!?!" ... He didn't have any great explanation as to why I should love it. (Did get my money back, tho'.) Since then I've been wary of buying Booker Prize novels. But am always curious to see which ones are nominated, which wins, which are shortlisted. I think, as with most prize competitions, judges give up handing out awards to the same people. Like the Academy Awards not going out too many times to the same actors who've already won Oscars and been nominated So Many Times Already. E.g.: Meryl Streep. So maybe that's why certain writers who've written wonderful novels this year but already won Bookers are left out -- even if they should be nominated again this year. What do you think?
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OK, so I managed to read it this time. It's a blockbuster of a novel, about 550 pages. And, to be fair, it's well written and keeps your interest. It's about a middle-class family in Calcutta from about 1920 to 1970 or thereabouts. However, it's not written serially - that would be too easy! But it's never really confusing. One nice touch is that for a considerable part of the book, there are two stories - one young man runs away to become a communist guerilla, and while he's away, his story is told in alternating chapters as a first-person diary as if written to a girlfriend. The rest of the story is normal third person. But I have several criticisms of the book. The first is that there seems to be nothing new here. It's a story of a family during a large part of the twentieth century - well, so what? That's been done over and over again. And the family doesn't seem to have a single person likeable person in it. Well, perhaps one. Most of them range from a bit surly to downright nasty. The other, more serious criticism is that there is just too much going on. We have in this family a communist guerilla, a maths genius, a drug addict, someone who is addicted to kinky sex (I won't specify, but the book spells it out in a most unpleasant chapter), and a girl who has a cast in one eye and darker skin than normal, which makes her unmarriagable. One of these - perhaps two - in a family might not seem reasonable. All of them (and there are one of two other more dysfunctional characters as well) seems unbelievable. I think there could have been two or three shorter novels here. It tells a story about a time and place I knew very little about. That in itself is quite interesting. But set against, that, it's too long, too convoluted, has practically no sympathetic characters, has some most graphic descriptions of violence (including a scene I had to skip over) and is, in the end, just a bit too much. I'll be astounded if it wins - to my mind, the flaws massively outweigh the good points. I'm frankly surprised it was short-listed.
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To Martin Z. -- You asked me why I thought that "Room" wasn't on the Short List. I was referring to that BBC-Radio show in which all the short-listed authors were interviewed. I didn't hear "Room" even mentioned; so thought it wasn't on the list. But I was in bed waiting for sleep -- so I must've "nodded off" somewhere during that broadcast ! ! Congrats on your book deal ! And, yes it seems a really good idea to give a little back to the charity shop that made that largesse possible. : )
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J C
17 years ago
I had wondered what you thought of the "Best of the Booker" - now I know!

Is there a book we might pick out of the list for a possible discussion? Of course, we North Americans might have trouble getting hold of some of them.
blossomgirl
17 years ago
I read only one book on that list so far "Child 44" and I agree there are some very gruesome parts to the story. Despite the horror what held me fascinated by this thriller were the graphic descriptions of Stalinist Soviet Union. It was a smart and orginal piece of writing so I have to say I liked the book however upsetting some of it was to read.
martin_z
Original Author
17 years ago
Just finished The Lost Dog. It didn't enthrall me, but it's interesting enough for me to want to read it again. Which may well be a good sign.
woodnymph2_gw
17 years ago
The only one I had heard of was the Salman Rushdie book. As Siobhan stated, we Americans often have a hard time finding these.
blossomgirl
17 years ago
One of the books that I thought I might want to read was Hanif's "A Case of Exploding Mangoes" about the plane crash ( was it murder?) of Pakistani Dictator General Zia. Also I heard good things about "A Fraction of the Whole" by Steve Toltz.
lemonhead101
17 years ago
Hmm. I have not heard of any of these books so I feel a bit uneducated about this. I will have to check the library to see if they have any.

Martin - got any favs?
martin_z
Original Author
17 years ago
Can't claim a favourite at this stage, as I've read only two. But The Secret Scripture is really quite something; I'd be surprised if it wasn't short-listed and I wouldn't be disappointed if it won.
blossomgirl
17 years ago
I went to Amazon.com to look up "The Secret Scripture". It is now going to my TBR list. The plot "pits two contradictory narratives against each other in an attempt to solve the mystery of a 100 year old mental patient."
pam53
17 years ago
I could not abide Child 44 which is the only one I have read. Scripture sounds interesting...

The Booker Prize Long List is out !

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