The United Kingdom biggest fiction prize announced its long list a week ago.
http://www.themanbookerprize.com/prize/t...

The first four seem relatively well known, so I didn't post reviews, the others may be a little more obscure, so I posted reviews, where I could find them.

(Normally there is a little poetry amongst the group, but not this year.)

James Leever's book, Me Cheeta, looks.....interesting.

Last years winner was Aravind Adiga's White Tiger and two years ago it was Kiran Desai's The Inheritance of Loss.

A.S. Byatt - The Children's Book
J.M. Coetzee - Summertime
Colm Toibin - Brooklyn
William Trevor - Love and Summer


Adam Foulds - The Quickening Maze
http://www.guardian.co.uk/books/2009/may...

Sarah Hall - How to paint a dead man
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/culture/books...

Samantha Harvey - The Wilderness
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/02/12/arts/1...

James Lever - Me Cheeta
http://www.independent.co.uk/arts-entert...

Hilary Mantel - Wolf Hall
http://www.guardian.co.uk/books/2009/apr...

Simon Mawer - The Glass Room
http://www.guardian.co.uk/books/2009/jan...

Ed O'Loughlin - Not Untrue & Not Unkind
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/home/books/ar...

James Scudamore - Heliopolis
http://www.guardian.co.uk/books/2009/jan...

Sarah Waters - The Little Stranger
http://entertainment.timesonline.co.uk/t...

I couldn't find when they publish the short list or announce the prize.

The shortlist will be announced on 8 September 2009.
The winner will be announced on 6 October 2009.

For more info: Man Booker Prize 2009 dates.

Reading Comprehension 1 - Nathaniel 0

(Nice job, Sophie.)

Has anyone read any of these, and if so, what did you think? I own Brooklyn, but know nothing about the others.

Hi Miss GP. I have heard of the authors but not to the books. More books to add to my list. LOL!

Mary

Hi Nataniel. Thank for posting this info. I've not read any of the books listed. Thanks for making me add more books to my ever growing list. We missed having you around.

mary

Hi Nathaniel! Thanks for these posts! Like everyone else on this thread, my list of books to read is now a lot longer. =)

BTW I loved POSSESSION by A.S. Byatt and THE MASTER by Colm Toibin. Haven't read any of their other novels, but I'm gonna try the ones in this list out.

Possession was great.

(Mary that's a great book group book.)

My favorite piece of trivia about the Booker was the Ruth Prawer Jhabvala won for Heat and Dust in '75 and then went on and wrote all those brilliant Merchant Ivory Films (Room With A View/Howards End/Remains of the Day.)

I've heard Toibin and Coetzee interviewed. Coetzee is especially amazing, but I've never read a page of either.

"Me Cheeta," is apparently a comic autobiography of Tarzan's sidekick. (That could be a hoot.)

A good paragraph about E. R. Burrough's from a NY Times article today:
Before he died in 1950 Burroughs published about two dozen Tarzan potboilers, his fictional character becoming an increasingly fantastical figure, speaking a dozen languages while battling the teensy Minunians and dinosaurs. An easygoing guy with a fondness for golf who settled in what came to be called, thanks to him, Tarzana, Calif., Burroughs never bothered to set foot in Africa, which is why Tarzan also faced off against Asian tigers and killed lions by wrestling them into a full nelson. As Gore Vidal once phrased it, the author of Tarzan was “not one to compromise a vivid unconscious with dim reality.”

Have you heard? There is a fun alternative to the Booker Prize... the Not the Booker Prize. And we can nominate a book.

Sound interesting? Check out the article in the Guardian: Not the Booker Prize

Need to think about my nominee, now.

Has anyone read any of these, and if so, what did you think?

I've read The Little Stranger. It was good but I am surprised it got nominated for the Mann Booker. I mean I wouldn't put it in the same class with some of the past winners, such as The White Tiger, Disgrace, or Life of Pi. But that's just me!

Mary wrote: "Has anyone read any of these, and if so, what did you think?

I've read The Little Stranger. It was good but I am surprised it got nominated for the Mann Booker. I mean I wouldn't ..."
Mary, I read that also because I always check out Man-Booker prize nominees. But I didn't think it was anyway good enough to be included on that list. Book was o.k. but if it was supposed to be a scary book it fell far short of that. And it certainly falls far short of what I consider prize material. So, it's not just you.

I'm a big fan of the Man Booker prize. I find them to be much mroe engaging than Pulitzers. Not sure why that is. They are somehow edgier, a little more daring.

I totally agree...have found some of my favorite books ever via the Booker lists. Inheritance of Loss was superb and I'm still waiting to read The White Tiger. I just ordered The Children's Hour by A. S. Byatt because it looked so intriguing.

The Short List for the prize was announced yesterday

J. M. Coetzee "Summertime"
A. S. Byatt "The Children's Hour"
Sarah Winter "The Little Stranger"
Adam Foulds "The Quickening Maze"
Hilary Mantel "Wolf Hall"
Simon Mawer "The Glass Room"

If Coetzee wins he will be the first person to ever win the Prize three times. His other two wins were in 1983 (Life & Tiems of Michael K) and in 1999 (Disgrace).

They announce the winner Oct. 6.

I saw this come across the news headlines. I never knew they announced the 'nominees' like the academy awards. I always just heard who won literary prizes. Interesting.

I've read The Little Stranger and thought it was excellent. No it wasn't scary but quite suspenseful(?) but it was beautifully written. A worthy winner.

Nathaniel wrote: "The Short List for the prize was announced yesterday

J. M. Coetzee "Summertime"
A. S. Byatt "The Children's Hour"
Sarah Winter "The Little Stranger"
Adam Foulds "The Quickening Maze"
Hilary Mantel..."

Hi Nataniel. Thanks for posting this. I've only heard of one of the books. "The Children's Hour." Too many books and so little time.

mary

Announced today- Hilary Mantel for "Wolf Hall".
Here's the piece from the NY Times.
http://artsbeat.blogs.nytimes.com/2009/1...

Amalia,thanks for tie in link to NY Times.
Much Appreciated by a novice like me!
You`re a Doll!!!!

The Booker is the weirdest literary prize. It never lands where you think it will. It almost deliberately seems to avoid high profile authors.

Well, as a consolation to A.S. Byatt I went out and bought The Children's Book tonight.

Amalia wrote: "Announced today- Hilary Mantel for "Wolf Hall".
Here's the piece from the NY Times.
http://artsbeat.blogs.nytimes.com/2009/1...
"
Hey Amelia thanks for the link...it seems I didn't see the news. Wolf Hall does seem a very interesting bit of book !!?!!

Nathaniel wrote: "Well, as a consolation to A.S. Byatt I went out and bought The Children's Book tonight. "

Don`t go giving me ideas for reasons to buy books!I`m trying to be a good Girlthis month!!

Here's another link my husband found for me:

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/entertainment...

It's an interview with one of the judges of the Booker and what the experience was like.

132 books from April to, let's say September? Wow! Wow! Wow! Wow!

Wolf Hall sounds really interesting. I was pleasantly surprised that a historical fiction book of that type won. I definitely want to read it!

Must be Good.

The Economist review of Wolf Hall
The Man Booker prizewinner
History today
Oct 8th 2009
From The Economist print edition

Wolf Hall. By Hilary Mantel. Henry Holt; 560 pages; $27. Fourth Estate; £18.99. Buy from Amazon.com, Amazon.co.uk

THE winner of this year’s Man Booker fiction prize is an historical novel with a difference. Set during the reign of Henry VIII, “Wolf Hall” (which will be published in America next week) covers the period of the king’s divorce from Catherine of Aragon and marriage to Anne Boleyn, but stops short of Anne’s execution. The title refers to the family seat of the Seymours, whose daughter Jane would eventually supplant Anne as queen and give Henry the son he so wanted.


Hilary Mantel does not believe in a history of grand narratives and big climaxes. Instead, her aim is to recreate the texture of the day-to-day ebb and flow of events as if they were unfolding before her eyes. Her main protagonist is Thomas Cromwell. His rise from working-class obscurity to king’s righthand man has always fascinated historians as an exemplar of ruthless Tudor social mobility. But Ms Mantel eschews the usual damning view of Cromwell, called “Henry VIII’s most notorious minister” in a recent non-fiction biography.

This is not the first time she has humanised one of history’s villains: she made us empathise with Robespierre in “A Place of Greater Safety”. Cromwell, in her version, is still a calculating Machiavellian, but in his family life he is capable of intimacy and warmth, despite childhood abuse at the hands of his father and a misspent youth in which he killed a man.

History tells us that the wheel of fortune will turn—Cromwell’s own neck will end on the block—but this novel deals only with his rise. Ms Mantel leaves us awestruck by his administrative and political genius, his ability to keep so many balls in the air, his resilience under stress. At the same time, she undermines the popular view of the sainted Thomas More, who she shows to be vain, self-serving in his own martyrdom and nasty to his wife.

Whether we accept Ms Mantel’s reading of history or not, her characters have a lifeblood of their own, particularly the urbane Cardinal Wolsey. Even the most minor characters—a boatman on the river, say, retailing common gossip about Anne Boleyn’s sex life—have a Shakespearean vigour. Stylistically, her fly-on-the-wall approach is achieved through the sustained use of the historic present tense, of which she is a master. Her prose is muscular, avoiding cod Tudor dialogue and going for direct modern English. The result is Ms Mantel’s best novel yet.

Thanks Nathaniel...

I have this on my shelf if anyone is interested in a side read :)

I just loaned my copy to a friend.

I just received my copy of Wolf Hall. Has anyone given it a go yet, and what do you think?

I can't WAIT to get that one and read it. It looks very good.

Hello!

I have added Wolf Hall to my amazon.ca wish list and will keep the fingers crossed! LOL! It sounds so good.

Maybe we could add as a side read thread ???
I will start it early new year.
I keep buying and buying knowing i wont be able to read them for some time *sigh*

Kate, that's a great thought. I would definitely be in for it.

Ok great Amalia , i will set something up :)
Are you ok for early new year ?

Yes, that's great timing for me. Thanks, Kate!

Ive added a thread incase anyone else who is reading now wants to discuss too :)

The list of winners & shorlisters 1969-2008
http://www.themanbookerprize.com/downloa...

Hi Kate. Thanks for posting that link.

Marbear