The longlist of the newly named Bailey's women's prize for fiction has been announced and our Eimear McBride [Girl is a Half-formed Thing] is up there again! This used to be the Orange prize and is a very prestigious award. There are twenty on the longlist including also Audrey Magee whose novel, The Undertaking, I reviewed on 21 February. There are seven US authors and in fact, the prize has been won by a US novelist for the past five years. Let's hear it however for McBride! For full details on the long list, see http://tinyurl.com/pham9zn.
This week, the inaugural winner of the Folio prize was announced and sadly McBride didn't make it. It was won by George Saunders for his novel, Tenth of December. According to Jonathan Ruppin, web editor of Foyles, "Saunders is one of
the mercurial masters of the short story that Britain's disinterest in
short-form fiction has prevented us from championing. These stories are satire at its most brutal, fiercely funny but also
bitter about a dystopian future that already seems to be coming to pass. He's a
deserved recipient, up there with [Kurt] Vonnegut."
I'll let you know what I think shortly!
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