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Linda Grant leads charge as the old guard are left off Booker list
Louise Jury, Chief Arts Correspondent9 Sep 2008
The latest epic from Salman Rushdie and the hotly tipped story of post-9/11 America by Joseph O'Neill have failed to make the Man Booker shortlist which was announced today.
Instead, Linda Grant, 57, Philip Hensher, 43, and Sebastian Barry, 53, are the best-known of the six writers who will contest Britain's most prestigious literary prize.
Grant, the only woman on the list, is nominated for The Clothes On Their Backs about a bookish girl cut off from her past and Hensher for The Northern Clemency about two families in Sheffield. Both authors live in London.
Barry, 53, from Ireland, has been nominated for his book The Secret Scripture which is about an elderly lady facing an uncertain future in a mental hospital.
The shortlist for the £50,000 award also includes two first-time authors - Aravind Adiga, 33, a Mumbai-born journalist, with The White Tiger, and Steve Toltz, 36, an Australian screenwriter who has also worked as a private investigator, with A Fraction Of The Whole.
Amitav Ghosh, 52, another Indian writer completes the list with Sea Of Poppies, set just before the Opium Wars.
Michael Portillo, chairman of the judges, said: "We recommend the six titles to readers with great enthusiasm. These novels are intensely readable, each of them an extraordinary example of imagination and narrative."
All were page-turners yet raised thought-provoking ideas and issues, he said. "These books are in every case both ambitious and approachable."
Janine Cook, of Waterstone's, said it was the strongest list since 2005 but an open field. "From a bookseller's perspective there are some potentially massive books here - the Booker can still send books to the top of the bestseller lists. I'd love to see White Tiger win. It's a fascinating story told with a fresh voice, as much a page-turner as any thriller but with so much going on in its pages."
Jonathan Ruppin, of Foyles bookshop-said Sea Of Poppies was the obvious-choice. "But I have a suspicion that A Fraction Of The Whole might just pip it in the judges' eyes. The absence of Rushdie means there will be a new star in the literary firmament."
The longlist was chosen from 116 entries and included The Enchantress Of Florence by Rushdie, and Neverland by O'Neill. Several much-talked-about novels - Child 44 by Tom Rob Smith, The Lost Dog by Michelle de Kretser and A Case Of Exploding Mangoes by Mohammed Hanif - were among the other titles on the 13-strong longlist. The winner will be announced at a ceremony-at Guildhall on 14 October. This year is the 40th anniversary of the Booker Prize.
The Victoria & Albert Museum is hosting an exhibition devoted to the story of the Booker over the years and celebratory events are being held at literary festivals.
