It turns out that I didn’t do very well in my prediction of the books that appeared on the Man Booker Prize long list!
I got three right:
- Hanya Yanagihara – A Little Life
- Anne Enright – The Green Road
- Anna Smaill – The Chimes
The others on the long list are:
- Tom McCarthy – Satin Island
- Andrew O’Hagan – The Illuminations
- Sunjeev Sahota – The Year of the Runaways
- Bill Clegg – Did You Ever Have a Family
- Laila Lalami – The Moor’s Account
- Marilynne Robinson – Lila
- Anne Tyler – A Spool of Blue Thread
- Marlon James – A Brief History of Seven Killings
- Chigozie Obioma – The Fishermen
- Anuradha Roy – Sleeping on Jupiter
I think that this is quite an interesting mix!
A few thoughts:
- There are a couple on here that I’ve not heard of – Did You Ever Have a Family and The Year of the Runaways
- I’m genuinely surprised that Rushdie and Ishiguro haven’t made the cut
- There are three debut novelists – Bill Clegg, Chigozie Obioma and Anna Smaill, which I think is quite unusual
- The last two years have been won by antipodeans (Eleanor Catton and Richard Flanagan) – will New Zealander Anna Smaill make it three in a row?
- Popular opinion suggests that Hanya Yanagihara will win this year
I look forward to the short list, which will be announced in September, and to picking up a few of these in the mean time!
Jo's Book Blog 
I think 3 out of 13 is pretty good for Booker Prize prediction guesses! I’m looking forward to reading A Little Life and A Spool of Blue Thread.
Maybe – it’s always a tricky one to guess! There are a few titles on the list here that I’m looking forward to, and A Little Life seems to be the favourite to win, from what I’ve seen so far, at least.