Even though this past month felt like it was endless at times, it still doesn't feel like a whole year could possibly have gone by since the longlist for the Man Booker Prize was announced. That must be the case, though, since this year's 13 picks have been announced:
Peter Carey Parrot and Olivier in America
Emma Donoghue Room
Helen Dunmore The Betrayal
Damon Galgut In a Strange Room
Howard Jacobson's The Finkler Question
Andrea Levy The Long Song
Tom McCarthy C
David Mitchell The Thousand Autumns of Jacob de Zoet
Lisa Moore February
Paul Murray Skippy Dies
Rose Tremain Trespass
Christos Tsiolkas The Slap
Alan Warner The Stars in the Bright Sky
The Man Booker prize was really the first annual literary prize that I ever became aware of and every year the longlist still makes me want to read each title before the shortlist and eventual winner are announced. I'd love to form my own opinion in advance on which book was the most deserving.
Of course, experience has taught me that some of the books that are on the longlist for this UK based prize won't have been published in the United States yet, so I no longer attempt this feat. The annual prize does add several titles to my own To Read list, though.
One of my favorite blogs, Band of Thebes, has pointed out that there are three openly LGBT authors among those on the longlist this year: Emma Donoghue, Damon Galgut, and Christos Tsiolkas.
It speaks to the international flavor of the award (which is for authors from the U.K., Ireland, or the Commonwealth of Nations made up of many of Britain's former colonies) that the three LGBT authors also represent different countries: Donoghue is from Canada by way of Ireland, Galgut is from South Africa, and Tsiolkas is Australian.
Both Tsiolkas and Galgut's books have been published in the United States, so I may well be reading those soon. The Slap, in particular, sounds like something I'd like to read (the description is taken from Joanne Wilkinson's Booklist review):
At a barbecue in a Melbourne suburb, a man loses his temper and slaps the child of the host’s friends. This incident unleashes a slew of divisive opinions, pitting friends and families against each other as the child’s parents take the man to court. Told from eight different viewpoints, the novel also deftly fills in disparate backstories encompassing young and old, single and married, gay and straight, as well as depicting how multiculturalism is increasingly impacting the traditional Aussie ethos. For good measure, the author also throws in male vanity, infidelity, and homophobia.
As always, though, almost every book on the list calls out to me in its own way. The shortlist will be announced on September 7th and the prize will be awarded on October 12th.
