Wednesday, February 18, 2009

Common Wealth Writer's Prize Shortlists

The Commonwealth Foundation today announced the regional shortlists for the 2009 commonwealth writer's prize. The regional winners that emerge from each of the shortlists will be announced on March 11, 2009.

I am really thrilled to see some of my favorites like Uwem Akpan's "Say You're One of Them, Aravind Adiga's "The White Tiger" and Mohammed Hanif's "The Case of Exploding Mangoes" on the list. Aravind Adiga is also nominated for "Between the Assassinations" for Best Book Prize. I hope he wins at least one. Preeta Samarasan's first book "Evening of the Whole Day" made it to the shortlist as well. I've been wanting to read it for a long time, I guess I should move it to the top of my TBR stack now.




African Regional Shortlist:

Best First Book
Jassy Mackenzie (South Africa) Random Violence Umuzi
Uwem Akpan (Nigeria) Say You're One of Them Abacus
Megan Voysey-Braig (South Africa) Till We Can Keep An Animal Jacana Media
Chris Mamewick (South Africa) Shepherds and Butchers Umuzi
Sue Rabie (South Africa) Boston Snowplough Human & Rousseau
Jane Bennett (South Africa ) Porcupine Kwela Books




South East Asia and Pacific Regional Shortlist


Best Book
Aravind Adiga (Australia) Between The Assassinations Picador India
Helen Garner (Australia) The Spare Room The Text Publishing Company

Joan London (Australia) The Good Parents Random House Australia (Vintage Imprint)
Paula Morris (New Zealand) Forbidden Cities Penguin New Zealand
Christos Tsiolkas (Australia) The Slap Allen and Unwin
Tim Winton, (Australia) Breath Picador

Best First Book
Aravind Adiga (Australia), The White Tiger Atlantic Books
Nam Le (Australia) The Boat Hamish Hamilton

Mo Zhi Hong (New Zealand) The Year of The Shanghai Shark Penguin New Zealand
Bridget van der Zijpp (New Zealand) Misconduct Victoria University Press
Preeta Samarasan (Malaysian) Evening is the Whole Day Fourth Estate
Ashley Sievwright (Australia) The Shallow End Clouds of Magellan

Jhumpa Lahiri and Salman Rushdie are among the six contenders for the Best Book in the Europe and South Asia Regional Category.



Best Book Award
Chris Cleave (United Kingdom) The Other Hand Sceptre
Shashi Deshpande (India) The Country of Deceit Penguin
Philip Hensher (United Kingdom) The Northern Clemency Fourth Estate
Jhumpa Lahiri (United Kingdom) Unaccustomed Earth Bloomsbury Publishing
David Lodge (United Kingdom) Deaf Sentence Harvill Secker
Salman Rushdie (United Kingdom) The Enchantress of Florence Random House

6 comments:

Tolulope Popoola said...

It's nice to see Uwem Akpan's book on there. I met him at a reading when he was shortlisted for the Caine Prize in 2007 and I liked his story.

Happy Reader said...

@Favoured Girl - Thanks for stopping by! I'm so glad Uwen Akpan's book won the the regional prize. So, Did you get to talk to him ? How exciting it must have been to meet him in person :)

The Bookaholic said...

There is no doubt that Uwem Akpan is a fine writer...we are also bibliophiles and it'd be nice to have you visit, comment and follow us here: http://bookaholicblog.blogspot.com/

See you online!

Unknown said...

I thought you might be interested in this site - a good way of keeping up with prize winners:
http://www.bookprizeinfo.com.

Happy Reader said...

@the bookaholic - Looks like a great blog. would love to visit often
@Dave - Thanks for the great link!!

Anonymous said...

the title of exploding mangoes should win it itself~!
-Aimee :)
www.myflutteringheart.blogspot.com