The Man Booker Prize 2010 |
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The Finkler Question
By Howard Jacobson
He should have seen it coming. His life had been one mishap after another. So he should have been prepared for this one...' Julian Treslove, a professionally unspectacular former BBC radio producer, and Sam Finkler, a popular Jewish philosopher, writer and television personality, are old school friends. Despite a prickly relationship and very different lives, they've never quite lost touch with each other - or with their former teacher, Libor Sevick, a Czech always more concerned with the wider world than with exam results. >Now, both Libor and Finkler are recently widowed, and with Treslove, his chequered and unsuccessful record with women rendering him an honorary third widower, they dine at Libor's grand, central London apartment. It's a sweetly painful evening of reminiscence in which all three remove themselves to a time before they had loved and lost; a time before they had fathered children, before the devastation of separations, before they had prized anything greatly enough to fear the loss of it. Better, perhaps, to go through life without knowing happiness at all because that way you have less to mourn? Treslove finds he has tears enough for the unbearable sadness of both his friends' losses. And it's that very evening, at exactly 11:30 pm, as Treslove, walking home, hesitates a moment outside the window of the oldest violin dealer in the country, that he is attacked. And after this, his whole sense of who and what he is will slowly and ineluctably change. The Finkler Questionis a scorching story of friendship and loss, exclusion and belonging, and of the wisdom and humanity of maturity. Funny, furious, unflinching, this extraordinary novel shows one of our finest writers at his brilliant best.
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Parrot and Olivier in America
By Peter Carey
From the two-time Booker Prize–winning author comes an irrepressibly funny new novel set in early nineteenth-century America.
Olivier—an improvisation on the life of Alexis de Tocqueville—is the traumatized child of aristocratic survivors of the French Revolution. Parrot is the motherless son of an itinerant English printer. They are born on different sides of history, but their lives will be connected by an enigmatic one-armed marquis.
When Olivier sets sail for the nascent United States—ostensibly to make a study of the penal system, but more precisely to save his neck from one more revolution—Parrot will be there, too: as spy for the marquis, and as protector, foe, and foil for Olivier.
As the narrative shifts between the perspectives of Parrot and Olivier, between their picaresque adventures apart and together—in love and politics, prisons and finance, homelands and brave new lands—a most unlikely friendship begins to take hold. And with their story, Peter Carey explores the experiment of American democracy with dazzling inventiveness and with all the richness and surprise of characterization, imagery, and language that we have come to expect from this superlative writer.
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Room
By Emma Donoghue
The story of a mother, her son, a locked room and the outside world. Jack is five and, like any little boy, excited at the prospect of presents and cake. He's looking forward to telling his friends it's his birthday, too. But although Jack is a normal child in many ways - loving, funny, bright, full of energy and questions - his upbringing is far from ordinary: Jack's entire life has been spent in a single room that measures just 12 feet by 12 feet; as far as he's concerned, Room is the entire world. He shares this world with his mother, with Plant, and tiny Mouse (though Ma isn't a fan and throws a book at Mouse when she sees him). There's TV too, of course - and the cartoon characters he thinks of as his friends - but Jack knows that nothing else he sees on the screen is real. Old Nick, on the other hand, is all too real, but only visits at night - like a bat - when Jack is meant to be asleep and hidden safely in Wardrobe. And only Old Nick has the code to Door, which is otherwise locked... Told in Jack's voice, ROOM is the story of a mother's love for her son, and of a young boy's innocence. Unsentimental yet affecting, devastating yet uplifting, it promises to be the most talked about novel of 2010.
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In a Strange Room
By Damon Galgut
The most intense and passionate novel to date from Man Booker-shortlisted author Damon Galgut: 'the bold, fresh voice of South African fiction.' - Observer. A young man takes three journeys, through Greece, India and Africa. He travels lightly, simply. To those who travel with him and those whom he meets on the way - including a handsome, enigmatic stranger, a group of careless backpackers and a woman on the edge - he is the Follower, the Lover and the Guardian. Yet, despite the man's best intentions, each journey ends in disaster. Together, these three journeys will change his whole life. A novel of longing and thwarted desire, rage and compassion, In a Strange Room is the hauntingly beautiful evocation of one man's search for love, and a place to call home.
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The Long Song
By Andrea Levy
THE AUTHOR OF "SMALL ISLAND "TELLS THE STORY OF THE LAST TURBULENT YEARS OF SLAVERY AND THE EARLY YEARS OF FREEDOM IN NINETEENTH-CENTURY JAMAICA
"Small Island "introduced Andrea Levy to America and was acclaimed as "a triumph" ("San Francisco Chronicle"). It won both the Orange Prize and the Whitbread Book of the Year Award, and has sold over a million copies worldwide. With "The Long Song," Levy once again reinvents the historical novel.
Told in the irresistibly willful and intimate voice of Miss July, with some editorial assistance from her son, Thomas, "The Long Song "is at once defiant, funny, and shocking. The child of a field slave on the Amity sugar plantation, July lives with her mother until Mrs. Caroline Mortimer, a recently transplanted English widow, decides to move her into the great house and rename her "Marguerite."
Resourceful and mischievous, July soon becomes indispensable to her mistress. Together they live through the bloody Baptist war, followed by the violent and chaotic end of slavery. Taught to read and write so that she can help her mistress run the business, July remains bound to the plantation despite her "freedom." It is the arrival of a young English overseer, Robert Goodwin, that will dramatically change life in the great house for both July and her mistress. Prompted and provoked by her son's persistent questioning, July's resilience and heartbreak are gradually revealed in this extraordinarily powerful story of slavery, revolution, freedom, and love. Andrea Levy was born in England to Jamaican parents. Her fourth novel, "Small Island," won both the Whitbread Book of the Year Award and the Orange Prize for Fiction: Best of the Best. She lives in London.
Longlisted for the Orange Prize for Fiction
Longlisted for the Man Booker Prize
Andrea Levy reinvents the historical novel with her novel "The Long Song," a tale of slavery and freedom in colonial Jamaica." "Told in the irresistibly willful and intimate voice of Miss July, with some editorial assistance from her son, Thomas, "The Long Song "is at once defiant, funny, and shocking. The child of a field slave on the Amity sugar plantation, July lives with her mother until Mrs. Caroline Mortimer, a recently transplanted English widow, decides to move her into the great house and rename her "Marguerite."
Resourceful and mischievous, July soon becomes indispensable to her mistress. Together they live through the bloody Baptist war, followed by the violent and chaotic end of slavery. Taught to read and write so that she can help her mistress run the business, July remains bound to the plantation despite her "freedom." It is the arrival of a young English overseer, Robert Goodwin, that will dramatically change life in the great house for both July and her mistress. Prompted and provoked by her son's persistent questioning, July's resilience and heartbreak are gradually revealed in this extraordinarily powerful story of slavery, revolution, freedom, and love. "When you add Levy's almost Dickensian gifts for dialogue and storytelling to her humorous detachment, her ability to see race hatred as yet another twist of the English class system, it's easy to understand why she has become something of a celebrity in Britain. In "The Long Song," Levy turns her attention to the final days of slavery in -early-19th-century Jamaica. Packaged with a preface and an afterword purporting to have been written by Mr. Thomas Kinsman, a well-to-do black printer living in Jamaica in 1898, and occasionally punctuated by editorial suggestions from that long-suffering man, the novel is presented as the memoirs of his octogenarian mother, Miss July, who was born into slavery on a sugar plantation known as Amity . . . In "The Long Song," she has painted a vivid and persuasive portrait of Jamaican slave society, a society that succeeded with bravery, style and strategic patience both to outsmart its oppressors and to plant the seeds of what is today a culture celebrated worldwide."--Fernanda Eberstadt, "The New York Times Book Review" "As well as providing a history of post-abolition Jamaica, "The Long Song" is beautifully written, intricately plotted, humorous and earthy. In patois-inflected prose, Levy conjures the greed and licentiousness of the island's sugar impresarios and heiresses as they indulge vast meals and sexual gropings--before casting Jamaica aside like a sucked orange. Those who enjoyed "Small"" Island" will love "The Long Song," not just for the insights on the 'wretched island, ' but as a marvel of luminous storytelling." --Ian Thomson, " Financial Times" "Often, the difference between a good read and a great one boils down to a single element: voice. Plot, characters, subject matter and style all factor in, but without a distinctive voice, literature is flat. No worries on that score - or any other--for Andrea Levy's vibrant fifth novel, "The Long Song," which follows her rich Whitbread and Orange Prize-winning "Small Island." Where "Small Island" concerned race, class and empire among West Indian immigrants in postwar England, "The Long Song" is about the bloody death throes of slavery in Jamaica in the 1830s. It's a history that may be unfamiliar to American readers, but Levy's novel, narrated in 1898 by a former slave named Miss July, makes it come alive with urgency and relevance. "The Long Song" sings the story of July's difficult life, which she writes at the prodding of her son, Thomas, a successful printer and editor with whom she lives in Kingston. As with American slave narratives, July's saga makes clear that slavery is a tragedy for all involved, destroying everyone's humanity . . . With this fresh, pugnacious voice, Levy has us in her thrall . . . Levy, the daughter of Jamaican immigrants who grew up in working-class North London, addresses racism at its ugliest and most virulent in this intricately imagined novel, creating a world in which little can flourish. The wonder is the spirit of indomitable dignity with which she manages to infuse her tragic tale."--Heller McAlpin, "San Francisco Chronicle" "Andrea Levy's insightful and inspired fifth novel, "The Long Song," reminds us that she is one of the best historical novelists of her generation. By employing a charming metafictional conceit--a printer is publishing the memoir of his mother, July--we witness the extraordinary life of a woman who lived as a slave in Jamaica during the 19th century . . . Levy's previous novel, Small Island, is rightly regarded as a masterpiece, and with "The Long Song" she has returned to the level of storytelling that earned her the Orange Prize in 2004 . . . One of the most complex and revealing moments in The Long Song is the dinner party in which the servants are told to prepare an English-style Christmas feast, though few of the menu items are available . . . "The Long Song" is a novel for those who believe that the story of a single woman is a story of the ages, for those who understand that a slave woman's history is History, indeed."--Tayari Jones, "The Washington Post""" "This is a terrific book: beautifully written and imagined, and full of surprises . . . A brilliant historical novel." --A. N. Wilson, "Reader's Digest" "There is great skill in the way [Levy] presents characters and dialogue; she has powers of observation and an ear for language that make her books a pleasure to read."--"The Times Literary Supplement""" ""The Long Song" is above all the female version of emancipation, told in vivid, vigorous language in which comedy, contempt and a fierce poetry are at work . . . For all that this is supposed to be the autobiography of a woman with 'little ink, ' edited by her anxious, seemly son, "The Long Song" is told with irresistible cunning; it is captivating, mischievous and optimistic, generating new stories and plot lines throughout the tale. July is one of Levy's stubborn women who inspire both irritation and admiration. She is a splendid creation, whose wit, pride and resilience sweeten a tale that would otherwise make her white readers hang their heads in shame." --Amanda Craig, " The Daily Telegraph""" "As a story of suffering, indomitability and perseverance, it is thoroughly captivating." --Alex Clark, "The" "Guardian" (UK)"" "Levy gives us a new, urgent take on our past."--"Vogue""" "An elegant allegory of storytelling . . . A subtly observed, beautifully written, structurally complex novel--an impressive follow-up to" ""Small"" Island".""" --"Kirkus Reviews" (starred review)
"In the inexplicable absence of a definitive and revelatory history of Jamaica's nearly 300 years of slavery, Levy gamely steps into the void with this lively and engaging novel . . . Charming, alarming, Levy's vibrant historical novel shimmers with all of the artifice and chicanery slave owners felt compelled to exert."--"Booklist"
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C
By Tom McCarthy
The acclaimed author of Remainder,which Zadie Smith hailed as "one of the great English novels of the past ten years,"gives us his most spectacularly inventive novel yet. Opening in England at the turn of the twentieth century,Cis the story of a boy named Serge Carrefax, whose father spends his time experimenting with wireless communication while running a school for deaf children. Serge grows up amid the noise and silence with his brilliant but troubled older sister, Sophie: an intense sibling relationship that stays with him as he heads off into an equally troubled larger world. After a fling with a nurse at a Bohemian spa, Serge serves in World War I as a radio operator for reconnaissance planes. When his plane is shot down, Serge is taken to a German prison camp, from which he escapes. Back in London, he's recruited for a mission to Cairo on behalf of the shadowy Empire Wireless Chain. All of which eventually carries Serge to a fitfuland perhaps fatefulclimax at the bottom of an Egyptian tomb . . . Only a writer like Tom McCarthy could pull off a story with this effortless historical breadth, psychological insight, and postmodern originality.
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The Betrayal
By Helen Dunmore
Leningrad in 1952: a city recovering from war, where Andrei, a young hospital doctor and Anna, a nursery school teacher, are forging a life together. Summers at the dacha, preparations for the hospital ball, work and the care of sixteen year old Kolya fill their minds. They try hard to avoid coming to the attention of the authorities, but even so their private happiness is precarious. Stalin is still in power, and the Ministry for State Security has new targets in its sights. When Andrei has to treat the seriously ill child of a senior secret police officer, Volkov, he finds himself and his family caught in an impossible game of life and death ? for in a land ruled by whispers and watchfulness, betrayal can come from those closest to you.. A gripping and deeply moving portrait of life in post-war Soviet Russia, The Betrayal brilliantly shows the epic struggle of ordinary people to survive in a time of violence and terror.
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The Thousand Autumns of Jacob de Zoet
By David Mitchell
The author of Cloud Atlas's most ambitious novel yet, for the readers of Ishiguro, Murakami, and, of course, David Mitchell. The year is 1799, the place Dejima, the "high-walled, fan-shaped artificial island" that is the Japanese Empire's single port and sole window to the world. It is also the farthest-flung outpost of the powerful Dutch East Indies Company. To this place of superstition and swamp fever, crocodiles and courtesans, earthquakes and typhoons, comes Jacob de Zoet. The young, devout and ambitious clerk must spend five years in the East to earn enough money to deserve the hand of his wealthy fianceacute;e. But Jacob's intentions are shifted, his character shaken and his soul stirred when he meets Orito Aibagawa, the beautiful and scarred daughter of a Samurai, midwife to the island's powerful magistrate. In this world where East and West are linked by one bridge, Jacob sees the gaps shrink between pleasure and piety, propriety and profit. Magnificently written, a superb mix of historical research and heedless imagination,The Thousand Autumns of Jacob de Zoetis a big and unforgettable book that will be read for years to come.
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February
By Lisa Moore
February is Lisa Moore's heart-stopping follow-up to her debut novel, Alligator, winner of the Commonwealth Writers' Prize for the Caribbean and Canadian region. Propelled by a local tragedy, in which an oil rig sinks in a violent storm off the coast of Newfoundland, February follows the life of Helen O'Mara, widowed by the accident, as she continuously spirals from the present day back to that devastating and transformative winter that persists in her mind and heart. After overcoming the hardships of raising four children into adulthood as a single parent, Helen's strength and calculated positivity fool everyone into believing that she's pushed through the paralyzing grief of losing her spouse. But in private, Helen has obsessively maintained a powerful connection to her deceased husband. When Helen's son, John, unexpectedly returns home with life-changing news, her secret world is irrevocably shaken, and Helen is quickly forced to come to terms with her inability to lay the past to rest. Lisa Moore's talent for rendering the precise details of her characters' physical and emotional worlds makes for an unforgettable glimpse into the complex love and cauterizing grief that run through all of our lives. With February, Moore tenderly investigates how memory knits together the past and present, and pinpoints the very human need to always imagine a future, no matter how fragile.
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Skippy Dies
By Paul Murray
Why does Skippy, a fourteen-year-old boy at Dublin's venerable Seabrook College, end up dead on the floor of the local doughnut shop? Could it have something to do with his friend Ruprecht Van Doren, an overweight genius who is determined to open a portal into a parallel universe using ten-dimensional string theory? Could it involve Carl, the teenage drug dealer and borderline psychotic who is Skippy's rival in love? Or could "the Automator"the ruthless, smooth-talking headmaster intent on modernizing the schoolhave something to hide? Why Skippy dies and what happens next is the subject of this dazzling and uproarious novel, unraveling a mystery that links the boys of Seabrook College to their parents and teachers in ways nobody could have imagined. With a cast of characters that ranges from hip-hop-loving fourteen-year-old Eoin "MC Sexecutioner" Flynn to basketballplaying midget Philip Kilfether, packed with questions and answers on everything from Ritalin, to M-theory, to bungee jumping, to the hidden meaning of the poetry of Robert Frost,Skippy Diesis a heartfelt, hilarious portrait of the pain, joy, and occasional beauty of adolescence, and a tragic depiction of a world always happy to sacrifice its weakest members. As the twenty-first century enters its teenage years, this is a breathtaking novel from a young writer who will come to define his generation.
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Trespass
By Rose Tremain
Trespassis about place, space, territory... and the iron grip of the past. Rose Tremain won the 2008 Orange Prize. Her thrilling new novel,Trespass, is a gripping story of redemption and revenge, in the sinister setting of the river gorges of the Cevennes. From the Hardcover edition.
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The Slap
By Christos Tsiolkas
The sensational international bestseller by Australia's "preeminent contemporary novelist" (The Age), in his United States debut Winner of the 2009 Commonwealth Writers' Prize, Christos Tsiolkas's The Slapis a riveting page-turner and a powerful, haunting rumination on contemporary middle-class family life. When a man slaps a child who is not his own at a neighborhood barbecue, the act triggers a series of repercussions in the lives of the people who witness the event-causing them to reassess their values, expectations, and desires. For readers of Jonathan Franzen and Tom Perrotta, this is a compelling account of modern society and the way we live today.
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The Stars in the Bright Sky
By Alan Warner
The Sopranos are back: out of school and out in the world, gathered in Gatwick to plan a super-cheap last-minute holiday to celebrate their reunion. Kay, Kylah, Manda, Rachel and Finn are joined by Finn's equally gorgeous friend Ava - a half-French philosophy student - and are ready to go on the rampage. Just into their twenties and as wild as ever, they've added acrylic nails, pedicures, mobile phones and credit cards to their arsenal, but are still the same thirsty girls: their holiday bags packed with skimpy clothes and condoms, their hormones rampant. Will it be Benidorm or Magaluf, Paris or Las Vegas? One thing is certain: a great deal of fast-food will be eaten and gallons of Guinness will be drunk by the alpha-female Manda, and she will be matched by the others' enthusiastic intake of Bacardi Breezers, vodkas and Red Bull. With Alan Warner's pitch-perfect ear for dialogue, pinpoint characterisation and glorious set-pieces, this is a novel propelled by conversation through scenes of excess and debauchery, hilarity and sadness. Like the six young women at its centre, The Stars in the Bright Sky is vivid and brimming with life - in all its squalor, rage, tears and laughter - and presents an unforgettable story of female friendship.
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