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American authors among 6 Booker Prize finalists

Two Canadian authors have made the short list of six writers for the Man Booker Prize.

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The six nominees, which came from a longlist of 13 titles, include the US writers Paul Beatty, for The Sellout, and 35-year-old Ottessa Moshfegh, who has been shortlisted to win the $66,400 cash prize for her psychological thriller, Eileen.

Bookies’ favorites to take the 50,000 pound ($66,000) fiction prize include “Hot Milk”, a tale of parent-child conflict by British writer Deborah Levy; “All That Man Is”, a portrait of masculinity in a fragmented Europe by Canadian-born British novelist David Szalay; and “The Sellout”, a taboo-busting satire of race and racism by American author Paul Beatty.

The chair of the judging panel, Dr. Amanda Foreman remarked that the remaining six titles “reflect the centrality of the novel in modern culture – in its ability to champion the unconventional, to explore the unfamiliar, and to tackle hard subjects”.

Three British authors joined two United States writers and one Canadian on the shortlist for the £50,000 award for fiction, with the victor to be announced on October 25 in London.

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And Canadians David Szalay and Madeleine Thien are shortlisted for All That Man Is and Do Not Say We Have Nothing.

One of the judges was actress Olivia Williams, who read numerous books between rehearsals and performances at London’s National Theatre. “I was banned from reading “The Sellout’ in bed by my husband because I kept shaking, I was laughing so much”.

Founded in 1969, the award had previously been open to writers from Britain, Ireland and the Commonwealth, but was expanded in 2014 to include all English-language authors.

“You might also say novelists without a reputation are more willing to take those kinds of risks because they’re not hamstrung by the sense of a readership”, he said.

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J.M. Coetzee has been knocked out of the Man Booker Prize dashing the Australian – South African’s author’s hopes of becoming the first writer to win the prestigious prize three times. For the protection of AP and its licensors, content may not be copied, altered or redistributed in any form. Doing so may result in civil and/or criminal penalties.

Australian- South African novelist J. M. Coetzee