I follow a lot of book prizes but the longlist of last year's International Booker Prize was the most enjoyable and interesting that I read. Last year's winner “The Discomfort of Evening” wasn't a personal favourite, but many other books up for the prize were among the best that I read in 2020 and I love that the prize helped me discover many new authors I've not read before. So I'm very excited to see the thirteen books that have been listed for this year's award. These are touted as the best books translated into English from the past year. They primarily come from European countries but some also originated in Argentina, China, Chile, Kenya and Palestine. Though they span many countries and historical periods something that connects a lot of these books is the way many blend form and genre to tell a unique story. Some combine fiction with memoir, history, travel, essay and poetry. I find this kind of innovation and diverse storytelling really exciting so I'm looking forward to reading many from the list.
Currently I've only read three of these books. “Minor Detail” by Adania Shibli was one of my top books that I read last year. It's such a powerful, artfully-written novel so I'm thrilled to see it get even more prize attention as it's already won an English PEN Award and was shortlisted for the National Book Award for Translated Literature. Unfortunately, “The War of the Poor” really didn't work for me as it felt like little more than an extended wikipedia entry about a fascinating 16thcentury historical figure. Vuillard is a highly respected writer and there are many positive reviews of this book so I was surprised to find it so disappointing and slight. However, it's thrilling that the inventive sci-fi novel “The Employees” is listed because this collection of testimonies from human and humanoids that work on a spaceship that discovers strange objects on an alien planet is such a pleasurable and thoughtful novel. It's also great see such an exciting and relatively new publisher Lolli Editions getting attention.
The shortlist will be announced on April 22nd and the winner will be announced on June 2nd so it will be interesting to follow which books progress forward in the competition. Several of these books I've not heard of before so I'm glad this longlist will introduce me to new writers and publications I wouldn't have found otherwise. I'm looking forward to reading them as well as joining in all the public discussion about them. You can watch me give summaries of each book here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JBlCQD_El2M
Which ones are you keen to read?
