IMPAC Shortlist Announced

The shortlist for the 2005 IMPAC Dublin Awards has been announced. The finalists are:

• Gardening at Night by Diane Awerbuck
• The Half Brother by Lars Saabye Christensen
• The Good Doctor by Damon Galgut
• Elle by Douglas Glover
• Phantom Pain by Arnon Grunberg
• The Great Fire by Shirley Hazzard
• Willenbrock by Christoph Hein
• Deafening by Frances Itani
• The Known World by Edward P. Jones
• The Fortress of Solitude by Jonathan Lethem

There are so many literary prizes around it’s hard to get excited about any of them, but what I like about the IMPAC is that the nominations are made by librarians from around the world and that the lists tend to be very eclectic. Last year’s winner was the Moroccan Tahar Ben Jelloun, for This Blinding Absence of Light (not that you could tell by reading the Times or anything.)

Related post: Mabrouk, Tahar.