Wednesday, August 08, 2007

No Ondaatje, no Coetzee, no Lessing

The Man Booker long list is out.

The judges issued a list of 13 books (smaller than the 18 of recent years) containing only one expected title: Ian McEwan's On Chesil Beach. That novel instantly became William Hill's 3/1 favourite to win the prize.

British author Edward Docx, 33, is the youngest on the list and has been included for Self Help, set in London and St Petersburg. Debut novels in the list include The Welsh Girl by Peter Ho Davies; Gifted by Nikita Lalwani, who lives in London; What Was Lost by British author Catherine O'Flynn and The Gift of Rain, set in 1930s Penang, by Malaysia-born Tan Twan Eng.

Winnie and Wolf, AN Wilson's story of the relationship between Winifred Wagner and Adolf Hitler, and The Reluctant Fundamentalist, about a Pakistani living in the US after September 11, by Pakistan-born author Mohsin Hamid, who lives in London, are also nominated. Hamid's second novel was described in the Guardian as "cleverly constructed fable of infatuation and disenchantment with America".

So that's McEwan and Hamid in the list, that I've read. Sould be interesting, no?

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