The longlist features both debut authors and award-winning novelists writing in English
The longlist for the 20th annual Baileys Women’s Prize for Fiction includes five debut novels and an author nominated for her 20th book.
Ali Smith, Sarah Waters, Rachel Cusk, Samantha Harvey and Xiaolu Guo are among the eight authors who have been shortlisted for the prize previously.
Chair of the judges, Shami Chakrabarti, said this year was “particularly strong” for women’s fiction.
The shortlist will be revealed on 13 April, with the winner named on 3 June.
Previous winners include Eimear McBride’s A Girl is a Half-formed Thing, Zadie Smith for On Beauty, Lionel Shriver’s We Need to Talk About Kevin and Andrea Levy for Small Island.
The prize celebrates “excellence, originality and accessibility” and any woman writing in English, whatever her nationality or country of residence, is eligible.
‘Incredibly excited’
Ali Smith’s novel How to Be Both was previously shortlisted for the Man Booker and Folio prizes. The book has already won the Costa Book Award’s novel category and the Goldsmiths Prize for original fiction.
Also on the list is Emma Healey’s Elizabeth is Missing – the winner of the Costa Book Award’s best first novel.
US author Anne Tyler is nominated for her 20th novel, A Spool of Blue Thread, while this year’s shortlisted debut novels include The Life of a Banana by PP Wong, Jemma Wayne’s After Before and Sara Taylor’s The Shore.
This year’s judging panel; Laura Bates, Shami Chakrabarti, Grace Dent, Helen Dunmore and Cathy Newman
The Paying Guests by Sarah Waters, Patricia Ferguson’s Aren’t We Sisters?, Grace McCleen’s The Offering and Kamila Shamsie’s A God in Every Stone also make the longlist.
This year’s judges include the prize’s first winner Helen Dumore, Channel 4 News’s Cathy Newman, columnist and broadcaster Grace Dent and …read more
Source:: BBC Entertainment
