T his year marks the 25th given to a work of fiction written by a woman and published in the United Kingdom during the previous year. The authors considered for the prize can be of any nationality, and the work must be a full-length novel. Founding director Kate Mosse says on the website for the award, “[The Women’s Prize] celebrates the very best full length fiction written by women throughout the world.” anniversary of the Women’s Prize for Fiction, an award Past winners of the award include Barbara Kingsolver, Zadie Smith, Hilary Mantel, Téa Obreht, and Ann Patchett. Last year’s winner was Tayari Jones for the novel An American Marriage . This year’s longlist, released March 2, is superb. There are big names, debut novels, and past winners among the sixteen nominated novelists. Bernardine Evaristo, author of Girl, Woman, Other , is one of the six authors nominated for a debut work. She shared last year’s Booker Prize with
Margaret Atwood, who is absent from this longlist (but who has won the Women’s Prize in the past). Other notable debut novels on the list include The Most Fun We Ever Had by Claire Lombardo, Queenie by Candice Carty- Williams, and Fleishman Is in Trouble by Taffy Brodesser-Akner. Past winner Ann Patchett is nominated for her book The Dutch House . Her novel Bel Canto won the 2002 prize, and she was shortlisted in 2012 for State of Wonder. Arguably, the brightest star on this year’s list is Hilary Mantel. She is nominated for The Mirror and the Light , the very highly anticipated finale of her Thomas Cromwell trilogy. The first two books in the series both won the Booker Prize, Wolf Hall in 2009 and Bring Up the Bodies in 2012. She has been shortlisted for the Women’s Prize for Fiction three times previously, but has never won. The Women’s Prize for Fiction shortlist will be announced April 22 and the winner awarded June 3.
2020 Women’s Prize for Fiction longlist
• Djinn Patrol on the Purple Line by Deepa Anappara • Fleishman Is in Trouble by Taffy Brodesser-Akner • Queenie by Candice Carty-Williams • Dominicana by Angie Cruz • Actress by Anne Enright • Girl, Woman, Other by Bernardine Evaristo • Nightingale Point by Luan Goldie • A Thousand Ships by Natalie Haynes • How We Disappeared by Jing-Jing Lee • The Most Fun We Ever Had by Claire Lombardo • The Mirror and the Light by Hilary Mantel • Girl by Edna O’Brien • Hamnet by Maggie O’Farrell • Weather by Jenny Offill • The Dutch House by Ann Patchett • Red at the Bone by Jacqueline Woodson
Kristen Johnson is a homesteader and home-school mom who lives in Eastern PEI. She loves to spend her free time between the pages of a book.
SPRING 2020 www.pei-living.ca SPRING 2020 www.pei-living.ca
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