Booker nominees list

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Tash Aw - The Harmony Silk Factory
John Banville - The Sea
Julian Barnes - Arthur & George
Sebastian Barry - A Long Long Way
JM Coetzee - Slow Man
Rachel Cusk - In the Fold
Kazuo Ishiguro - Never Let Me Go
Dan Jacobson - All For Love
Marina Lewycka - A Short History of Tractors in Ukrainian
Hilary Mantel - Beyond Black
Ian McEwan - Saturday
James Meek - The People's Act of Love
Salman Rushdie - Shalimar the Clown
Ali Smith - The Accidental
Zadie Smith - On Beauty
Harry Thompson - This Thing of Darkness
William Wall - This Is The Country

Quite fancied reading Arthur and George. But once again I've not read a single thing they've nominated. Anyone read any on the list? Views? Opinions?

― Navek Rednam (Navek Rednam), Wednesday, 10 August 2005 16:03 (twenty years ago)

What a surprise that they have nominated books by Barnes, Coetzee, Ishiguro, McEwan, and Rushdie!

― jaymc (jaymc), Wednesday, 10 August 2005 17:24 (twenty years ago)

Indeed. I somehow restrained myself from typing "It looks like another case of somebody saying: 'Round up the usual suspects.'"

― k/l (Ken L), Wednesday, 10 August 2005 18:26 (twenty years ago)

that's the long-list - the shortlist is usually 6 books.

― jed_ (jed), Wednesday, 10 August 2005 19:07 (twenty years ago)

God, I loathe Coetzee. I talked to him once and he was a total flat-out douche. His books are boring, too. This is my well-considered editorial position.

― Remy (x Jeremy), Wednesday, 10 August 2005 19:14 (twenty years ago)

12/17 male, by the by.

― Remy (x Jeremy), Wednesday, 10 August 2005 19:17 (twenty years ago)

what

― John (jdahlem), Wednesday, 10 August 2005 19:43 (twenty years ago)

I think he's saying the nominating committee is phallogocentric.

― k/l (Ken L), Wednesday, 10 August 2005 19:51 (twenty years ago)

i am sure you are very proud of yourself

― John (jdahlem), Wednesday, 10 August 2005 19:57 (twenty years ago)

Nope.

― k/l (Ken L), Wednesday, 10 August 2005 20:01 (twenty years ago)

Coetzee's "Disgrace" is my favourite booker winner. An Astonishing book.

― jed_ (jed), Wednesday, 10 August 2005 20:49 (twenty years ago)

To be fair: I only read "Life and Times of Michael K.," and part of his second autobiography. The first seemed like the type of piece one would write precisely if one were interested in being encysted in academic regard, and the second was read with that wry NPR-academic wit that I secretly thing of as professor porn.

― Remy (x Jeremy), Wednesday, 10 August 2005 21:10 (twenty years ago)

to be fair also - it's the only book of his i have read.

― jed_ (jed), Wednesday, 10 August 2005 22:09 (twenty years ago)

one month passes...

heck i could have picked this list with my eyes closed and one hand tied behind my back. (and i haven't read any of them)

Banville, John The Sea
Picador
Barnes, Julian Arthur & George Jonathan Cape
Barry, Sebastian A Long Long Way Faber & Faber
Ishiguro, Kazuo Never Let Me Go Faber & Faber
Smith, Ali The Accidental Hamish Hamilton
Smith, Zadie On Beauty Hamish Hamilton

― scott seward (scott seward), Tuesday, 13 September 2005 21:33 (twenty years ago)

although i suppose not going for the coetzee, mcewan, rushdie trifecta shows some sort of restraint.

― scott seward (scott seward), Tuesday, 13 September 2005 21:36 (twenty years ago)

dullest shortlist ever. there was a programme on TV where they announced the shorlist and they all sounded bloody awful from the extracts. terrible middle of the road overwritten english with stories divorced from anything but a very narrow sense of reality. Julian Barnes (a shoo-in) writes a story reimagining the life of Arthur Conan Doyle? no thanks. Zadie Smith with her book about a middle aged academic having an affair? what the fuck is she writing a book about a middle class academic for? what age is she, 60?

― jed_ (jed), Tuesday, 13 September 2005 21:54 (twenty years ago)

We always try to see all the movies up for best picture before the Oscars, and I've been thinking about reading all the Booker shortlist. Actually bought Never Let Me Go last weekend, but somehow I don't think it's going to happen.

― Jaq (Jaq), Tuesday, 13 September 2005 21:55 (twenty years ago)

The best book usually doesn't win anyway; the decisions are all about politics and deals and money, much like the Academy Awards

― salexander, Wednesday, 14 September 2005 07:29 (twenty years ago)

How, the judges are bribed? With book deals?
I suppose it would explain why your favourite book never wins.

― Ray (Ray), Wednesday, 14 September 2005 07:56 (twenty years ago)

Have you ever tried to read Coetzee's "Life and Times of Michael K"? What tedious drivel. Now there can only be 2 explanations for this novel winning the Booker: (1) the quality of the field that year was exceedingly poor, which is unlikely considering it was competing against Rushdie's "Shame" and Swift's "Waterland" among others; or (2) the board was corrupt! (Maybe they were all sleeping with the publisher or Coetzee himself!)On the other hand, I have thoroughly enjoyed some of the other winners, so perhaps this theory is debunked.

― salexander, Wednesday, 21 September 2005 00:29 (twenty years ago)

I thought Life of Pi and Vernon God Little were both awful, nowhere near as good as some of the other stuff published that year, or anything else on the shortlist. But I think they won because of a misplaced desire to appeal to the popular market, not corruption. And in general, people like different things.

― Ray (Ray), Wednesday, 21 September 2005 07:16 (twenty years ago)

Why is a list of great modern novelists so boring? I think it's wonderful that so many good authors have produced new and worthy works this year. I'd like to read the whole list before I judge, but I do know that I fell in love with Ishiguro's novel from the first few pages (I've never seen a man capture so well the horrible emotions/acts female friends are capable of) and am happy to see it included. I often don't care who wins these things; the shortlists are far more exciting.

― zan, Wednesday, 21 September 2005 12:21 (twenty years ago)

Did they nominate big fishes like Rushdie on face value only, to be gobbled up by the smaller ones or did they really enjoy the dragging works of these leviathans?

― Jobin Scaria, Sunday, 2 October 2005 05:37 (twenty years ago)

I guess Arthur & George will win. Can't wait for it to get published.

― Fred (Fred), Sunday, 2 October 2005 09:58 (twenty years ago)

Banville wins it. Surprised me, friends had told me how dull it was.

― Navek Rednam (Navek Rednam), Monday, 10 October 2005 20:31 (twenty years ago)

I watched the dreadul TV coverage. The result is bad. Of course, I have not read this book - but I have read other Banvilles which practically prop up my list of the worst fiction I have ever experienced. Barnes would have been a worthy winner. I think this result a travesty.

― the pinefox, Tuesday, 11 October 2005 12:34 (twenty years ago)

I've not read any of the books so probably shouldn't comment. But based on my previous experience of reading Banville I too find it difficult to imagine that he could write a book worth reading, never mind worth a major literary prize.

― frankiemachine, Tuesday, 11 October 2005 16:43 (twenty years ago)

both OTM. though i only read half of "The Book of Evidence" i was staggered at how bad it was.

― jed_ (jed), Tuesday, 11 October 2005 18:15 (twenty years ago)

Yes! It's horrible!

It is good that we agree.

― the pinefox, Tuesday, 11 October 2005 19:30 (twenty years ago)

Oh whew, I thought maybe it was just me -- I left off pretty much as soon as he ran into his mother.

― nabisco (nabisco), Wednesday, 12 October 2005 21:02 (twenty years ago)

Erica Wagner from the Times was on Charlie Rose a few nights back, and seemed to indicate that she didn't really like the nominees very much, apart from The Accidental. For a moment I wished I were watching anything but Charlie Rose -- or at least any interviewer who might press her to spill the beans on how the decisions get made. You know: "If you weren't one of the people who liked it, who was? Do y'all pressure one another and shit? Are there gift baskets involved? Demystify, girl."

― nabisco (nabisco), Wednesday, 12 October 2005 21:05 (twenty years ago)

(After that he had Justine Levy, and she kept knocking her mic against her jacket with her Frenchy hand-gesticulations, and Charlie Rose said nearly nothing, right up until it was revealed that he was having trouble following her accent: she says "Marguerite Duras" and he says "Alexander Dumas?" and she says "Marguerite DURAS." I ROFFLED. But in a very droll, bookish way.)

― nabisco (nabisco), Wednesday, 12 October 2005 21:08 (twenty years ago)

There was an incredibly smug article in The Times yesterday by Rick Gekoski claiming to be the judge responsible for Banville's win. Ensure that your loved ones are out of the room before reading it, as the desire to hit someone else in his absence could lead to behavious you subsequently regret:

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/article/0,,923-1821672,00.html

― frankiemachine, Thursday, 13 October 2005 15:22 (twenty years ago)

behavious?

― frankiemachine, Thursday, 13 October 2005 15:34 (twenty years ago)

THE MAN BOOKER PRIZE HAS FINALLY BEEN REDEEMED DUE TO THE FACT THAT I CHOOSE THE WINNA!

― jed_ (jed), Thursday, 13 October 2005 16:36 (twenty years ago)

I found "Life and Times of Michael K" enthralling. Maybe you have to be of a certain disposition in order to understand it, but I loved it.

― anders, Friday, 14 October 2005 20:47 (twenty years ago)

haha this is like reading a Pazz & Jop thread on ILM! awesome!

― Matos-Webster Dictionary (M Matos), Wednesday, 19 October 2005 05:01 (twenty years ago)

Nabisco, that's hilarious. Here is a transcription of a (hypothetical) Charlie Rose interview with Gena Rowlands:
"John Cassavetes. You worked with him, you were married to him- what was it like?" (pr. the words "John" and "like" with a hint of a drawl)

― k/l (Ken L), Wednesday, 19 October 2005 12:26 (twenty years ago)

three weeks pass...

www.thebookpeople.co.uk are selling the six shortlisted books for £29.99

― Mädchen (Madchen), Thursday, 10 November 2005 11:40 (twenty years ago)

Excellent value for money!

― PJ Miller (PJ Miller 68), Thursday, 10 November 2005 12:07 (twenty years ago)

nine months pass...

The longlist for the Man Booker Prize for Fiction 2006 is as follows;

Carey, Peter Theft: A Love Story (Faber & Faber)
Desai, Kiran The Inheritance of Loss (Hamish Hamilton)
Edric, Robert Gathering the Water (Doubleday)
Gordimer, Nadine Get a Life (Bloomsbury)
Grenville, Kate The Secret River (Canongate)
Hyland, M.J. Carry Me Down (Canongate)
Jacobson, Howard Kalooki Nights (Jonathan Cape)
Lasdun, James Seven Lies (Jonathan Cape)
Lawson, Mary The Other Side of the Bridge (Chatto & Windus)
McGregor, Jon So Many Ways to Begin (Bloomsbury)
Matar, Hisham In the Country of Men (Viking)
Messud, Claire The Emperor’s Children (Picador)
Mitchell, David Black Swan Green (Sceptre)
Murr, Naeem The Perfect Man (William Heinemann)
O’Hagan, Andrew Be Near Me (Faber & Faber)
Robertson, James The Testament of Gideon Mack (Hamish Hamilton)
St Aubyn, Edward Mother’s Milk (Picador)
Unsworth, Barry The Ruby in her Navel (Hamish Hamilton)
Waters, Sarah The Night Watch (Virago)

― Jeff LeVine (Jeff LeVine), Saturday, 19 August 2006 18:51 (nineteen years ago)

The Nipper's early prediction: O'Hagan will win.

― Jerry the Nipper (Jerrynipper), Saturday, 19 August 2006 22:28 (nineteen years ago)

i recognize almost none of these authors. is that an accomplishment or not?

― Josh (Josh), Monday, 21 August 2006 08:03 (nineteen years ago)

i was about to say the same as JtN.

― jed_ (jed), Monday, 21 August 2006 10:08 (nineteen years ago)

We're in the same boat, Josh. I recognize four of them and a couple sound "almost familiar." But I do have copies of the Carey and Mitchell sitting somewhere on my shelves.

― I'm Passing Open Windows (Ms Laura), Monday, 21 August 2006 19:19 (nineteen years ago)

I'm with you Josh, and Laura... but quite a few of the titles haven't been released in the US yet. Maybe there's hope for me yet?

― Vacillatrix (x Jeremy), Monday, 21 August 2006 19:27 (nineteen years ago)

this jacket designer is being kept busy anyway

http://www.apwatt.co.uk/images/books/Robertson_GIDEON_MACK.jpg http://image.guardian.co.uk/sys-images/Books/Pix/covers/2006/04/24/black1.jpg

― jed_ (jed), Monday, 21 August 2006 19:34 (nineteen years ago)

(i don't like his work AT ALL)

― jed_ (jed), Monday, 21 August 2006 19:35 (nineteen years ago)

Reminds me of kindergarden, when we'd draw with a gluestick and sprinkle glitter on it.
I only know of two of those authors, but I'm quite happy with that. Would've been dull if I knew most of the people on the list. Hopefully some of them are good.

― Øystein (Øystein), Tuesday, 22 August 2006 00:35 (nineteen years ago)

Did you say Booker?
Well, that rhymes with snooker!
And that starts out with a "snook"!

So since I'm a cocker,
Some snook at the Booker
I'll cock at its long list of books.

― Aimless (Aimless), Tuesday, 22 August 2006 01:18 (nineteen years ago)

Lovely aimless - but booker doesn't rhyme with snooker in my country.

― sandy mc (sandy mc), Tuesday, 22 August 2006 08:03 (nineteen years ago)

Rats and double rats, I wanted to read BLACK SWAN and now it's going to be reserved at the library for the next six months. God forbid I buy a book.

More interested in the children's chapter book list:

Flush
Carl Hiaasen
Random House Children's Books
0375821821

Inkspell
Cornelia Funke
Scholastic, Incorporated
0439554004

Miraculous Journey of Edward Tulane
Kate DiCamillo
Candlewick Press
0763625892

Penultimate Peril
Lemony Snicket
HarperCollins Publishers
0064410153

Ptolemy's Gate
Jonathan Stroud
Miramax Books
0786818611

And young adult offerings:

Book Thief
Markus Zusak
Alfred A. Knopf Incorporated
0375831002

Dairy Queen
Catherine Gilbert Murdock
Houghton Mifflin Company
0618683070

Eldest
Christopher Paolini
Random House Children's Books
037582670X

Elsewhere
Gabrielle Zevin
Farrar, Straus & Giroux
0374320918

King Dork
Frank Portman
Delacorte Books for Young Readers
0385732910

― Laurel (Laurel), Tuesday, 22 August 2006 17:20 (nineteen years ago)

I never really grok the complaints that all the "obvious" people are listed on the adult side, because I don't move in or really understand that world...but it's a lot easier for me to see on the kid's lists. I haven't read any of the books on either list I posted, but I know all the authors...and there's only one or two that I'm independently interested in. Hmmph.

― Laurel (Laurel), Tuesday, 22 August 2006 19:19 (nineteen years ago)

OH SHIT. I just realized I'm posting the Quill nominees, a whole different ball of crumpled, acid-free text stock. BSG is on both so I mentally leapt into the void...and fell.

― Laurel (Laurel), Tuesday, 22 August 2006 19:22 (nineteen years ago)

Of the Booker list, I only know Carey, Gordimer, and Mitchell.

― jaymc (jaymc), Tuesday, 22 August 2006 19:24 (nineteen years ago)

Hmmm ... I've read all of those nominated in the children's chapter list and three of those on the young adult list.

Is this something to be proud of?

― I'm Passing Open Windows (Ms Laura), Tuesday, 22 August 2006 20:14 (nineteen years ago)

Sure! It means you are Keeping Up in tots' lit.

― Laurel (Laurel), Tuesday, 22 August 2006 20:18 (nineteen years ago)

Carey, Peter Theft: A Love Story (Faber & Faber)

Didn't like his last book, skipped this one. He's got enough Bookers, surely. Two? Something like that.

Gordimer, Nadine Get a Life (Bloomsbury)

Love! But have not read this.

McGregor, Jon So Many Ways to Begin (Bloomsbury)

Wow, I actually have this book, in hardback! Because I really loved If No-one Speaks of Remarkable Things, and I had a Waterstone's voucher. Because this is the only book on this list I own, I shall be rooting for it.

Mitchell, David Black Swan Green (Sceptre)
I have his other one but haven't read it yet.

O’Hagan, Andrew Be Near Me (Faber & Faber)
Used to be the lead singer of the Fatima Mansions. No, wait...

Unsworth, Barry The Ruby in her Navel (Hamish Hamilton)
I've read two Barry Unsworth books and they were both great. So this one must be too.

Waters, Sarah The Night Watch (Virago)
I've only read Fingersmith, but it was great.

― accentmonkey (accentmonkey), Tuesday, 22 August 2006 20:40 (nineteen years ago)

McGregor, Jon So Many Ways to Begin (Bloomsbury)

Wow, I actually have this book, in hardback! Because I really loved If No-one Speaks of Remarkable Things, and I had a Waterstone's voucher. Because this is the only book on this list I own, I shall be rooting for it.

Wow - I too loved If No-one SPeaks of Remarkable Things but had completely forgotten the author's name - thanks for the heads-up, I think I need to make another trek to the bookstore.

― I'm Passing Open Windows (Ms Laura), Wednesday, 23 August 2006 03:39 (nineteen years ago)

Sure! It means you are Keeping Up in tots' lit.

I'm kinda embarrassed that I don't have any tots, though.

On the other hand, some of the YA stuff I've read has been much more compelling than some of the "Adult" crap that's being published these days.

― I'm Passing Open Windows (Ms Laura), Wednesday, 23 August 2006 03:40 (nineteen years ago)

I don't have any tots, either! Although I am sort of in the biz, so that's my excuse for reading more YA than adult -- but the resurgence of fantasy/genre lit in YA has been a huge boon for my reading enjoyment, and I'm in a lazy stage w/r/t densely written adult fic. Anway, sorry, Booker talk!

― Laurel (Laurel), Wednesday, 23 August 2006 11:55 (nineteen years ago)

I read James Lasdun's "The Horned Man." It was dark and bizarre. I liked it.

― Beth Parker (Beth Parker), Wednesday, 23 August 2006 21:15 (nineteen years ago)

three years pass...

2009:

"A S Byatt The Children's Book (Random House, Chatto and Windus)

J M Coetzee Summertime (Random House, Harvill Secker)

Adam Foulds The Quickening Maze (Random House, Jonathan Cape)

Hilary Mantel Wolf Hall (HarperCollins, Fourth Estate)

Simon Mawer The Glass Room (Little, Brown)

Sarah Waters The Little Stranger (Little, Brown, Virago)"

Hilary Mantel seems like the safest bet as the winner this year.
anyone read anything from the list?

― Zeno, Tuesday, 15 September 2009 18:36 (sixteen years ago)

Haven't listened to it yet, but the New York Review of Books podcast channel has Coetzee reading from Summertime.

― Squash weather (Eazy), Tuesday, 15 September 2009 18:59 (sixteen years ago)

I just went through the lists of Booker nominations since its inception and I have read one of them. I wish I could put that down to my esoteric tastes. But no. Although I do own quite a few of the others!

― Akon/Family (Merdeyeux), Tuesday, 15 September 2009 19:43 (sixteen years ago)

Nine. Pleasantly surprised to see that I enjoyed them all very much, except 'England, England' (okay but dragged a bit) and Amsterdam (utterly pointless).

― Ismael Klata, Tuesday, 15 September 2009 19:55 (sixteen years ago)

Amsterdam's one of the ones I own! O no. I will probably double my knowledge in the next month or so with On Beauty.

― Akon/Family (Merdeyeux), Tuesday, 15 September 2009 20:12 (sixteen years ago)

Summertime is really, really good. Haven't read the other 5, though I do HAVE the Sarah Waters--did my thing of buying it the day it came out, and then not actually getting round to reading it for months.

― When two tribes go to war, he always gets picked last (James Morrison), Tuesday, 15 September 2009 23:49 (sixteen years ago)

three weeks pass...

anyone read Wolf Hall?

― sonderborg, Wednesday, 7 October 2009 22:44 (sixteen years ago)

yeah: I really liked it, though I preferred her 'a place of greater safety'. She's an engaging writer, she's very good at making the period vivid without anachronising, so you enter utterly into these questions and dilemmas that are ordinarily v foreign to modern life. (my only problem with it was that I kept getting reminded of Dorothy Dunnet's 'Niccolo' series and then tangling myself up in 'why is this one more booker-nom worthy than that one'-type questions)

― tlönic irrigation (c sharp major), Wednesday, 7 October 2009 22:59 (sixteen years ago)

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