The Buzz...About Books

Orange Prize Loses Sponsorship

UK mobile services company Orange has announced today it is withdrawing its sponsorship of the Orange Prize for Fiction, a prestigous literary prize celebrating the contribution of women writers.  Orange has supported the prize for 17 years but the company has decided to concentrate its sponsorship activities on film rather than literature.  Organizers of the prize plan to continue with a new sponsor.

The Orange Prize is open to all women writers regardless of nationality, country of residence, age or subject matter.  Each year the winner receives £30,000 and a bronze statue called The Bessie.  Past winners have included Canadian writers Anne Michaels for her novel Fugitive Pieces and Carol Shields for Larry's Party. 

This year's finalists are:

Foreign Bodies by Cynthia Ozick

        Large Print

        eBook

        eAudiobook

The Forgotten Waltz by Anne Enright
        eBook     

Half Blood Blues by Esi Edugyan

        Audiobook

        eBook       

Painter of Silence by Georgina Harding

        (to be published in Canada in August 2012)

Song of Achilles by Madeline Miller

        eBook

State of Wonder by Ann Patchett

        Audiobook

        Large Print

        eAudiobook

        eBook

The 2012 winner will be announced on May 30.

Related Page:

Orange Prize Award Page--winners and finalists since 2007

Andrew Carnegie Medal Finalists Selected

The American Library Association and the Carnegie Corporation of New York today announced the finalists for the inaugural Andrew Carnegie Medal honouring excellence in fiction and nonfiction for adult readers.  Althought the American Library Association has long sponsored awards for children's literature like the Caldecott and Newberry Medals, this is the first award that focuses on adult readers.

The winners will be selected by a panel of library professionals and announced on June 24 at the ALA's annual conference.

Fiction

The Forgotten Waltz by Anne Enright

• eBook

Lost Memory of Skin by Russell Banks

Swamplandia by Karen Russell

• Audiobook
• eBook
• eAudiobook

Nonfiction

Catherine the Great: Portrait of a Woman by Robert K. Massie

• eBook
• eAudiobook

The Information: a History, a Theory and a Flood by James Gleick

• Audiobook
• eBook
• eAudiobook

Malcolm X: a Life of Reinvention by Manning Marable

• Audiobook
• eBook
• eAudiobook
• Talking Book (restricted to Print Disabled patrons)

Jane Rogers wins the Arthur C. Clarke Award

Jane Rogers has won Britain's most prestigious Science Fiction award, the Arthur C. Clarke Award,  for her novel The Testament of Jessie Lamb.

Set  in the near future, the world has been forever changed by an act of bioterrorism.  A virus that kills pregnant women is on the loose and women are dying by the millions.  The future of the human race is in serious peril.

Jessie Lamb is an ordinary sixteen year-old girl who decides to save the human race.  She volunteers to become impregrated with an immune embryo, which will require her to to be put into a coma from which she will never recover.  Her parents are horrified by her decision.  They see it as an idealistic act by an impressionable young woman and set about to stop her.

The Testament of Jessie Lamb is Jane Rogers first venture into Science Fiction and appeared on the  Man Booker Prize's Longlist last year. 

 The other books on the shortlist were:

• Hull Zero Three by Greg Bear
• The Postmortal by Drew Magary
• Embassytown by China Miéville
• Rule 34 by Charles Stross
• The Waters Rising by Sheri S. Tepper

Three Canadians Nominated for Commonwealth Book Prize

This year three Canadian writers are competing for the Commonwealth Book Prize.  Formerly called the Commonwealth Writers' Prize, the focus of the award has been changed.  In addition to the name change it now honours debut novels by writers from Commonwealth countries.  The structure remains similar to the former prize: nominated books compete regionally and the five regional winners compete for the overall award.

Nason, Senior, and Skibsrud will compete for the Canada and Europe Regional prize against three UK writers.

This is the complete list of nominees in all regions.  Please note that some of the international titles have not yet been released in Canada.

Canada and Europe

A Cupboard Full of Coats by Yvette Edwards (UK)
    -- eBook
The Dancing and the Death on Lemon Street by Denis Hirson (UK)
Dancing Lessons by Olive Senior (Canada)
Pao by Kerry Young (UK)
    --eBook
The Sentimentalists by Johanna Skibsrud (Canada)
    -- Audiobook
    -- eBook
    -- eAudiobook
    -- Talking Book (restricted to Print Disabled patrons)
The Town that Drowned by Riel Nason (Canada)

Africa

The Dubious Salvation of Jack V. by Jacques Strauss (South Africa) 

Jubilee by Shelley Harris (South Africa)

Patchwork by Ellen Banda-Aaku (Zambia)

 

Asia

The Book of Answers by C.Y. Gopinath (India)
Chinaman: the Legend of Pradeep Mathew by Shehan Karunatilaka (Sri Lanka)
Rebirth by Jahvni Barua (India)
The Sly Company of People Who Care by Rahul Bhattacharya (India)
The Wandering Falcon by Jamil Ahmad (Pakistan)
    -- Large Print
    -- eBook

Caribbean

 

 

Sweetheart by Alecia McKenzie

 

 

Pacific

Me and Mr Booker by Cory Taylor (Australia)
The Ottoman Motel by Christopher Currie (Australia)
Purple Threads by Jeanine Leane (Australia)
The Vanishing Act by Mette Jakobsen (Australia)

The winners of the regional awards will be announced on May 22 and the overall winner on June 8.

Pulitzer Prize Winners Announced

This year, for the first time since 1977, there will be no Pulitzer Prize given for fiction.  The jurors have announced that they could not reach a concensus and will therefore not present this award.

The Pulitzer Prizes for books are awarded in several categories.

Biography or Autobiography

 

 

 

 

 

 

Winner:
George F. Kennan: an American Life by John Lewis Gaddis

Finalists:
Love and Capital: Karl and Jenny Marx and the Birth of a Revolution by Mary Gabriel

Malcolm X: a Life of Reinvention by Manning Marable
        Audiobook
        eBook
        Talking Book (restricted to Print Disabled patrons)

Drama

 

 

 

 

 

 

Winner:
Water by the Spoonful by Quiara Alegría Hudes

Finalists:
Other Desert Cities by Jon Robin Baitz

Sons of the Prophet by Stephen Karam

Fiction

 

 

 

 

 

 

Finalists:
The Pale King: an Unfinished Novel by David Foster Wallace
        Audiobook
        Large Print

Swamplandia by Karen Russell
        eAudiobook
        eBook       

Train Dreams by Denis Johnson

General Non-Fiction

 

 

 

 

 

 

Winner:
The Swerve: How the World Became Modern by Stephen Greenblatt
        eAudiobook

Finalists:
One Hundred Names for Love: a Stroke, a Marriage and the Language of Healing by Diane Ackerman
        Large Print
        eAudiobook

Unnatural Selection: Choosing Boys over Girls, and the Consequences of a World Full of Men by Mara Hvistendahl

History

 

 

 

 

 

 

Winner:
Malcolm X: a Life of Reinvention by Manning Maracle
        Audiobook
        eBook
        Talking Book (restricted to Print Disabled patrons)

Finalists:
Empires, Nations & Families: a History of the North American West, 1800-1860 by Anne F. Hyde

The Eleventh Day: the Full Story of 9/11 and Osama Bin Laden by Anthony Summers and Robbyn Swan

Railroaded: the Transcontinentals and the Making of Modern America by Richard White

Poetry

 

 

 

 

 

 

Winner:
Life on Mars by Tracy K. Smith

Finalists:
Core Samples from the World by Forrest Gander

How Long by Ron Padgett

Man Asian Literary Prize is Awarded to Kyung-Sook Shin

The Man Asian Literary Prize  is awarded annually to the best novel by an Asian writer, either written in or translated into English. For the first time in its five year history, it has been awarded to a woman.   Kyung-sook Shin was honoured for her novel Please Look After Mom, a story of a family's search for its matriarch after the woman disappears in a crowded subway station in Seoul.  A bestseller in the author's native South Korea, the foreign rights to the book have been sold in 19 countries.

 

Please Look After Mom will be the featured book on Book Buzz, Toronto Public Library's virtual book club during May 2012.  Register to become a member.

Man Asian Literary Prize 2011 Shortlist

Dream of Ding Village by Lianke Yan

The Lake by Banana Yoshimoto

Rebirth by Jahvni Barua
    (Not yet published in Canada)

River of Smoke by Amitav Ghosh

The Sly Company of People who Care by Rahul Bhattacharya

The Wandering Falcon by Jamil Ahmad

The poem that ignited the Renaissance

In The Swerve: How the World Became Modern, Stephen Greenblatt tells the story of Poggio Bracciolini and his discovery of  Titus Lucretius Carus' influential poem De Rerum Natura (On the Nature of Things).  According to Greenblatt, it is the discovery of this beautiful poem, which had been lost for more than a thousand years, that was the spark that begun the Renaissance and therefore the beginning of the modern world. 

Lucretius' poem contained some very dangerous ideas for 15th century Europe.  It claimed that the universe functions without the help of gods, that death should not be feared because there is no afterlife, and that the world is made up of very small particles that are randomly colliding and swerving.  Greenblatt argues that these ideas went on to have a significant impact on the great thinkers who followed, including Galileo, Freud, Darwin and Einstein.

Greenblatt presents a vivid picture of the political, intellectual and religious climate of the early 1400s, when the Roman Catholic Church was split between several Popes and interest in the works of Greek and Roman philosophers was reviving.  Bracciolini, one of the great bookhunters of his time, spent his life trying to find lost classical manuscripts, such as On The Nature of Things, by visiting remote monasteries where generations of monks had spent their time copying, and recopying, the books in their collections.

 

The Swerve was a engaging and enjoyable book, easily understood by anyone with a basic knowledge of history. It may appeal to those who enjoy medieval and Renaissance history  as well as anyone interested in the history of philosophy.  Fans of Richard Dawkins and Christopher Hitchens may also find it of interest, as Lucretius' philosophy is part of the history of the their ideas.

 

The Swerve was the winner of the 2011 National Book Award for Non-Fiction. Reviews for this book appeared in the Globe and Mail, and The Guardian, and The New York Times. The Swerve is also available as an eAudiobook.

 

For more suggestions of non-fiction books, have a look at our Literary Non-Fiction We Recommend list.

Winning Reads--Books that Inspired Oscar Nominated Films

Tonight's Academy Awards ceremony promises glitz, glamour and celebrities.  It's important to note that some of the motion picture magic has been inspired by literature.  This year a number of the movies nominated for Best Picture were based on books.

 

The Descendants by Kaui Hart Hemmings.
Hemmings' novel inspired the movie about a family in crisis.
 

Other Formats:
eBook
eAudiobook

Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close by Jonathan Safran Foer
A boy searches New York for answers after his father dies in the World Trade Center on 9/11.

Other Formats:
Audiobook
eBook
eAudiobook
Talking Book (restricted to Print Disabled patrons)

The Help by Kathryn Stockett
Kathryn Stockett's best-selling novel inspired the film about maids in Mississippi in the 1960s and the feisty woman who wanted to tell their story.
Other Formats:
Large Print
Audiobook
eBook
eAudiobook
Talking Book (restricted to Print Disabled patrons)

The Invention of Hugo Cabret by Brian Selznick
This award-winning children's novel about a boy living in a Paris train station was the source material for Hugo, a film by Martin Scorsese. 

Other Formats:
Audiobook
eAudiobook

 

Moneyball: The Art of Winning an Unfair Game by Michael Lewis
Lewis' book about baseball manager Billy Beane's innovative and successful attempt to use computer analysis to draft players was the inspiration for Moneyball.

Other Formats:
eAudiobook

War Horse by Michael Morpurgo
It's been a play and a movie, but it began as a children's book. The film has been nominated for best picture and best adapted screenplay. 

Other Formats:
Large Print
Audiobook
eAudiobook 

 

Books and stories also inspired films nominated in other categories:

Albert Nobbs, the Glenn Close vehicle, was based on a short story called The Singular Life of Albert Nobbs by George Moore which can be found in The Bodley Head Book of Longer Short Stories, 1900-1974.

Rooney Mara is nominated for her role as Lizbeth Salander, a character created by Stieg Larsson in his novel, The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo.

Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows by J.K. Rowling provided the story for Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows, part 2, the conclusion of the Harry Potter series.

In Darkness, nominated for Best Foreign Language Film, is based on Robert Marshall's non-fictional book In the Sewers of Lvov: the Last Sanctuary from the Holocaust.

Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy by John LeCarre provided the inspiration for the film of the same name.

Charles Taylor Prize Shortlist

The Charles Taylor Prize was founded in 2000 to honour Canadian literary non-fiction.  The shortlist was announced on January 10.

This year's nominees are:

Afflictions and Departures: Essays by Madeline Sonik

The Chimps of Fauna Sanctuary: a Canadian Story of Resilience and Recovery by Andrew Westoll

Eating Dirt: Deep Forests, Big Timber, and Life with the Tree-Planting Tribe by Charlotte Gill

Into the Silence: the Great War, Mallory, and the Conquest of Everest by Wade Davis

The Measure of a Man: the Story of a Father, a Son and a Suit by J.J. Lee

The winner will be announced on March 5, 2012.

Start the New Year with a Best Seller

As 2011 draws to a close, The Sisters Brothers written by Patrick deWitt, has been appearing on many Best Books of the Year lists. It has already won the Governor General's Literary Award and been Shortlisted for the Man Booker Prize and the Giller Prize. Ablutions, deWitt's debut novel, was also well-received. Originally from Vancouver Island, Patrick deWitt is a new author to watch for in the future.

Set in 1851 during the gold rush, Eli and Charlie Sisters are hired gunslinger for the Commodore, a man who is as famous as he is feared. The brothers have been hired, once again, to travel from Oregon City to San Francisco to hunt down and kill a prospector named Herman Kermit Warm. The Commodore mysteriously never tells the brothers how Warm has wronged him. Everywhere they go, the Sisters' brothers strike fear in the hearts of everyone they meet. Their brutality is legendary. Suring their journey they have many adventures, including run-ins with Indians, a bear, a witch, a lost boy, a vengeful frontier baron, saloon ladies, and a gang of fur trappers.

Eli, the more sympathetic brother, narrates the tale. As he witnesses his brother's cruelty, blood-lust and addiction to drink and women, he begins to realize that this may be his last job for the Commodore and he may just consider settling down to a quiet, peaceful life.

Also available in:

Audiobook

Large Print

Talking Book (Restricted to Print Disabled Patrons)