The Mookse and the Gripes discussion
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Booker Prize for Fiction
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2021 Booker Prize Speculation
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WndyJW
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Dec 16, 2020 08:00PM
Sam’s letter probably played a large part in Booker’s decision.
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Depending on the other nominees I might agree with that Paul. As I said I didn’t love it while reading it. I liked it while reading it, but it was after I finished it that it struck me as important.
Guardian overview of fiction for H1 2020 in the UK - which would suggest several possible contenders:https://www.theguardian.com/books/202...
I agree with him on Lean, Fall Stand
Whether they make the Booker list or not, some of these sound fun to read. I'm looking forward to Steven Hall's new book and Fiona Mozley's Hot Stew.
For Netgalley users, quite a lot of these are available for request (at least in the UK site)
Gumble's Yard wrote: "I agree with him on Lean, Fall Stand"I don't agree with him on the new Frances Spufford:
Light Perpetual (Faber, February) is a high-concept work – think Kate Atkinson’s Life After Life and Paul Auster’s 4321. It’s about a bomb falling on London in 1944, about parallel lives, about the many what-might-have-beens
It's a well written story of live in England, and London in particular, in the 65 years after WW2, but (and the book's blurb makes similar claims) the 4321/Kate Atkinson aspects really doesn't come through in my view.
I have flicked through that book and based on that would agree.
A new Murakami collection (albeit I suspect the New Yorker has printed several of the stories) and a new Rachel Cusk novel (eek!), which I hadn't previously realised were coming in 2021.
Here is Lithub's preview of U.S. upcoming publications which not only covers Booker possibilities, but could be referenced for Women's Prize and BTBA as well.https://lithub.com/lit-hubs-most-anti...
We trust Lit-hub to highlight good books, don’t we? They wouldn’t include potential best sellers just because the publishers sent over PR info, right?
New Sally Rooney novel announced for September. Beautiful World, Where Are You tells the story of Alice and Eileen, two best friends nearing their thirties in different places and on very different trajectories. As the summer approaches, they exchange emails about art, friendship, the world around them and the complicated love affairs unfolding in their own lives. They say they want to see each other again soon. But what will happen when they do?
I will refrain from comment
I'm down for the new Sally Rooney. September looks to be a big month. Meanwhile, more potential reads for 2021 from the Millions list.https://themillions.com/2021/01/most-...
I saw that on Twitter. I also refrained from comment.
I’ll say it: I will be able to sleep at night if I miss the Sally Rooney. 🙂That Millions list just added a lot of books to my wishlist.
Seems people here don't much care for Sally Rooney. Is there is any particular reason for that? I think she is going to be responsible for the revival of the 'slow' novel in the larger public consciousness. She seems to have this ability to hide the slowness of her plots in heaps of drama. Said drama is often shallow(for me, at least), but it helps a lot of people get through her work. Could love to hear what you veteran readers have to say about her.
I think she is great - both in her writing (Normal People I expected to hate but it absolutely just worked for me) and in her support and publication of other writers via when she edited Stinging Fly. She also written two characters whose relationship has worked and captured loads of followers both in the novel and now in the TV series. But I have been in a minority of close to one here in the past.
My favourite quote from NP
One night the library started closing just as he reached the passage in Emma where it seems like Mr Knightly is going to marry Harriet, and he had to close the book and walk home in a state of strange emotional agitation …………. It feels intellectually unserious to concern himself with fictional people marrying one another. But there it is – literature moves him.
And (as my review concludes) ... there it is – this book moved me.
I like Sally Rooney - she’s great at portraying relationships in an introspective manner. I do think she is overrated though
I am struggling what she adds other than selling books and gets people reading. I'd put her in a bucket with James Patterson, Lee Child and (if he ever writes one) George Martin. I can see that a lot of people are fans but I'm a literary snob I must admit and don't regard sales or TV adaptability as positively correlated with quality.
Speaking only for myself, I've really enjoyed both of Sally Rooney's books. I think GY's quote regarding Emma above is apt, because Rooney reminds me very much of classic novels of the 19th century. On the surface it's all different -- there's sex! millennials! -- but the rhythm of the plots, the will-they-won’t-they romances, the class dynamics remind me a lot of Austen, for example. And though I’m not usually a fan of such minimalist prose, I like it when Rooney does it. In some ways they’re like guilty pleasure books, but I don’t feel guilty afterwards because they still have literary merit.Based on reviews I’ve read, some people are alienated by the angsty educated millennial characters. Maybe I don’t mind because I’m part of that group! At the same time, so much literary fiction is about angsty writers or angsty professors, so maybe that's not what bugs people...
I’m not the target audience for her books, I guess. They’re not objectionable, but they just don’t do anything for me.
I've only read Conversations with Friends and didn't find it particularly smart or witty but did read it fast - it felt like a hipster-ish upmarket version of chick lit to me!
Emily wrote: "Speaking only for myself, I've really enjoyed both of Sally Rooney's books. I think GY's quote regarding Emma above is apt, because Rooney reminds me very much of classic novels of the 19th century..."You can draw a straight line from Liz and Darcy of Pride and Prejudice and Connell and Marianne of Normal People. That's the awesome thing about her. She is writing fiction that needs you to be patient for the reward and the reward is wonderful. I do think the generational divide is a big thing when it comes to liking her work and I see that as a positive thing in this instance. The younger generation(mine) needs a writer like her. I wish it was someone more attuned to the social problems, but she'll do for now. I firmly believe that she is rewiring the reading habits of all lot of people. Patience in an impatient world sort of thing. This might help younger readers to read more serious work.
I do hold it against her that she's keeping writing about writers. There is nothing out there that I hate to love than a novel about a writer. There have been so much of them that I can't stand it.
I did not like CWF at all - and so had intended to hate Normal People (I read it on the day of publication due to my normal issue of having already read the rest of the longlist) but I think the Austen-overlap struck me and I really enjoyed it. She is not a brilliant literary novelist though and its a little daft to claim she is (James Marriot of the Times if people remember had a complete fit when she did not win the Booker) - but I would say comparing her to Paterson/Child is just as daft - Paul in his review actually turns into Will Self as he admits.
Mod
Avinash wrote: "You can draw a straight line from Liz and Darcy of Pride and Prejudice and Connell and Marianne of Normal People..."Agree on a lot of that
The Social Problem thing is odd as she is very left wing I think - I guess NP does do an interesting job of capturing class differences. Paul would hate her even more if she started dissing banks and landlords!!
And writing about writers should indeed be banned - but plenty of very literary authors - who are much loved deservedly here - do that all the time.
Gumble's Yard wrote: "And writing about writers should indeed be banned - but plenty of very literary authors - who are much loved deservedly here - do that all the time.."I feel every young novelist is allowed a book or two about a writer (if you're learning how to write a novel, it's okay to take a shortcut somewhere) but it should definitely be banned after that. I confess I'm not thrilled that her third novel is also about a writer...but I expect I'll read in anyway when it comes out in paperback.
Other things that should be banned: novels about people in Brooklyn, actually most novels set in New York.
Boy get girl, boy loses girl, boy gets girl.......boy loses girl, as I tell my granddaughters about the teen rom-coms they enjoy. I think reading is valuable and people should read what they enjoy. I don’t have any particular complaint about Rooney, just that her prose is serviceable, her characters didn’t move me, and the story didn’t interest me, there were no profound or interesting insights into class, but it worked for many others so good for her. I won’t likely read another by her.
One of the oddities of the Booker has been that since Richard Flanagan won in 2014 (the year after Catton won for New Zealand) - there has been an almost complete disappearance (one 2015 longlist sighting) of Antipodean authors from the prize altogether, let alone shortlists or winners.Appropriately enough Flanagan's new novel - which is about disappearances - is published in the UK today: "The Living Sea of Waking Dreams"
https://www.goodreads.com/review/show...
Not sure if it will make the Booker - it has already I think divided opinions here (eg I know Wendy and John were fans, Neil and Paul not so much) - given its mix of important and very timely messaging (social media, climate change) against some very uneven writing (mirroring social media) and a far from subtle (possibly Saramago inspired) fantastical plot device (mirroring climate change). Newspaper reviews in the UK seem equally split. I think it would be a good edition to the longlist as it would certainly cause some debate.
But one book I would love to see break the trend is "The Yield" by Tara June Winch (published in the UK next week) - which seems to be unifying opinion so far about how clever it is
https://www.goodreads.com/review/show...
Gumble's Yard wrote: "I did not like CWF at all - and so had intended to hate Normal People (I read it on the day of publication due to my normal issue of having already read the rest of the longlist) but I think the Au..."Agree strongly with this. I did not like CWF at all but picked up Normal People when it was longlisted for the Booker and was surprised by how much I liked it and how compelling I thought the writing style was. Also agree that James M. went a bit too far in his love for the novel, but I thought it was worthy to be on the longlist (personally I was more upset when Warlight did not make the shortlist that year). I will certainly read Rooney's new novel.
The Yield looks exceptional. I have to confess as much I liked The Sea of Waking Dreams when I finished it, I haven’t thought of it since, I agree it should at least be Longlisted though.
I’ve heard so many good things about the yield but I’ll officially start buying books in April - I want to decrease the TBR stack
I didn’t buy a book today. I wanted to, but with shipping it’s 3 times the cost of the book: Luckenbooth.
Luckenbooth is very good.The reviewers in the Times and the Telegraph each separately hailed it as likely to be the weirdest book of 2021, and we are only in early January. And the 2020 Goldsmiths winning author gives it a rave in the Guardian today (he goes for ‘brilliantly strange’): https://www.theguardian.com/books/202...
My take: https://www.goodreads.com/review/show...
Just reading what I expect to be a strong Booker contender - The Committed - and came across the line (which is important to the themes the book investigates about the aftermath of the Vietnam War and what happens to the victims of revolutions)“You have to take the long view. Look at America. No one remembers now what happened to the Americans who chose to side with the British king. Should the American Revolution not have happened, or should we condemn it because all those people were exiled?”
Reason I mention it is I wonder who the Chair of Judges will react given she is well (maybe best) known for her book Liberty’s Exiles which is precisely about that exact group of white and black loyalists.
https://www.google.co.uk/amp/s/amp.th...
I plan to start that book today. Hopefully, you will finish before me so that I can copy your review (that's my new policy, as you've noticed).
I have read The Sympathizer, but a long time ago and I have forgotten most of it. But this book, I think, picks up where that left off and the narrator does a good job of filling you in on what happens in the first book. I think you can read this standalone, but I am not far into it so can’t be sure.
I think it’s probably best if you have read The Sympathizer as it’s designed very deliberately and explicitly by the author as a straight sequel - picking up exactly where the latter left off and with many of the same characters appearing throughout and resolving stuff from that book. I would say though if you read The Sympathizer ages ago you definitely don’t need to re-read and there are plenty of spoiler heavy summaries of the first book around eg even the Wikipedia for it has a complete plot. And as Neil says there are lots in the book also.
Just posted my review of the second (spoiler free) if you want to get a feel for the book .... or just watch Pulp Fiction.
https://www.goodreads.com/review/show...
I just came here to update my comment now that I am 100 pages in, but GY has said it all. The two are really just a single book in two volumes, so it makes sense to have read the first, but there are so many reminders in the second that you can probably get away with reading a Wikipedia plot summary.
New Guy Gunaratne coming, as of now, early next year so should be eligible for 2022 Booker Prize. There is a new Isabel Waidner coming in June of this year. Since the publisher contribution has been scrapped, Booker possibility?
Hard to say Areeb - they feel too experimental for the Booker. Paul is the person to ask
I would be surprised if hardcore avant-garde books made the Booker list.
The New Wilderness made it.
Well if the judges have any sense Isabel's book should be given the prize now pre publication and the shortlist/longlist stage abandoned. But the Booker does seem rather conservative so I suspect not.
Oh right. Good point, Gumble. New Wilderness was mold shattering, totally unexpected in form and language. It eluded me; utterly.
I just added A Town Called Solace by Mary Lawson to the list. She wrote The Other Side of the Bridge which was longlisted in 2006 (excellent book).
Ang wrote: "I just added A Town Called Solace by Mary Lawson to the list. She wrote The Other Side of the Bridge which was longlisted in 2006 (excellent book)."And on the TBR it goes!
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The Mookse and the Gripes
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