Irish authors Colm Tóibín and Ronan Bennett have made the long list of 22 books announced yesterday for this year's Man Booker Prize for Fiction.
Tóibín's The Master, published by Picador, and Bennett's Havoc, in its Third Year, published by Bloomsbury, were among the 22 books chosen from the 132 titles considered. The shortlist will be released on September 21st, while the winner will be announced on October 19th. Last year's Irish representation on the long list was Gerard Donovan, selected for his debut novel, Schopenhauer's Telescope.
Bookmakers are at odds over the Irish authors' chances of winning the overall prize of £50,000. Ladbrokes put Tóibín at 8/1, and Bennett at a less promising 20/1. William Hill bookmakers see the Irish contenders as more of an outside chance, giving Tóibín odds of 12/1 and putting Bennett at 25/1. The favourite to win at Ladbrokes is Alan Hollinghurst, with The Line of Beauty, published by Picador, which gets odds of 4/1.
The William Hill favourite, Cloud Atlas by David Mitchell, gets even shorter odds at 3/1. William Hill said it has "never quoted a book at shorter odds at this stage of the competition".
This is the first Booker nomination for Bennett, whose third novel, The Catastrophist, was shortlisted for the Whit- bread Novel Award in 1999.
"I'm very pleased to get onto the long list," he said. "Every time you publish, you hope it will do well, but this is great."
Havoc, in its Third Year, Bennett's fourth novel, is set in 17th-century northern England and is his first historical work.
"It's about intolerance and persecution. It deals with a larger political struggle set against a smaller, more domestic, love story."
Toibín was shortlisted in 1999 for his fourth novel, The Blackwater Lightship.
The chair of this year's judging panel, Mr Chris Smith MP, commended the number of new novelists who had made the list. "This has been a very rich year for fiction and we have a strong and varied long list of 22 books," he said. "I'm particularly pleased that there are a number of first or second novels on the list, as well as a number of well-established writers. The list is a mixture of seriousness and fun; it ranges across several continents; it goes back and forwards in time; get- ting a shortlist of six out of this variety will be a nightmare."
The other judges are novelist Tibor Fischer; writer and academic, Robert Macfarlane; journalist and editor of the Erotic Review, Rowan Pelling; and literary editor of the Economist, Fiammetta Rocco.
The winner of the Man Booker Prize receives £50,000. The six shortlisted authors each receive a cheque for £2,500. Last year's winner was DBC Pierre with Vernon God Little.
The last Irish winner was Roddy Doyle for Paddy Clarke Ha Ha Ha in 1993.
LONG LIST: AUTHOR TITLE - PUBLISHER
Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie - Purple Hibiscus - 4th Estate
Nadeem Aslam Maps for Lost Lovers - Faber & Faber
Nicola Barker Clear: A Transparent Novel - 4th Estate
John Bemrose The Island Walkers - John Murray
Ronan Bennett Havoc, in its Third Year - Bloomsbury
Susanna Clarke Jonathan Strange & Mr Norrell - Bloomsbury
Neil Cross Always the Sun - Scribner
Achmat Dangor Bitter Fruit - Atlantic Books
Louise Dean Becoming Strangers - Scribner
Lewis Desoto A Blade of Grass - Maia Press
Sarah Hall The Electric Michelangelo - Faber & Faber
James Hamilton Paterson Cooking with Fernet Branca - Faber & Faber
Justin Haythe The Honeymoon - Picador
Shirley Hazzard The Great Fire - Virago
Alan Hollinghurst The Line of Beauty - Picador
Gail Jones Sixty Lights - Harvill Press
David Mitchell Cloud Atlas - Sceptre
Sam North The Unnumbered - Scribner
Nicholas Shakespeare Snowleg - Harvill Press
Matt Thorne Cherry - Weidenfeld & Nicolson
Colm Tóibín The Master - Picador
Gerard Woodward I'll go to Bed at Noon - Chatto & Windus
