Prize awards £40,000 to the winner.
By The American Bazaar Staff
WASHINGTON, DC: Akhil Sharma’s heart-rending novel ‘Family Life’ is one of the eight finalists for the prestigious 2015 Folio Prize, which awards £40,000 to the winner.
The five women and three men writers from the UK, Ireland, US, Canada, Kenya and India named on the shortlist of this literary prize now in its second year, were culled from 80 books that were nominated, and will be in contention for the award to be presented in London, on March 23, according to the website RTE.
The Folio prize is designed to highlight the best in English-language fiction, regardless of form, genre and geography.
The debut 2014 award went to the American short-story writer George Saunders for his collection of short stories, ‘Tenth of December’.
Read the review of ‘Family Life’ by Akhil Sharma in The American Bazaar here
Ali Smith’s ‘How to Be Both’ which won the Costa novel award and the Goldsmiths prize and has already been runner-up in the Booker prize, is a strong contender this year. The other finalists are: Colm Tóibín’s ‘Nora Webster’, Ben Lerner’s ‘10:04’, Miriam Toews’ ‘All My Puny Sorrows’, Yvonne Adhiambo Owuor’s debut novel ‘Dust’, Rachel Cusk’s ‘Outline’, and Jenny Offill’s ‘Dept. of Speculation’.
The Chair of the judging panel William Fiennes, said in a statement: “This shortlist is the result of months of reading and hours of passionate conversation. The eight books we’ve chosen explore vast themes – time, loss, belonging, war, solitude, marriage and family, the making and the mystery of art – with amazing vitality and grace.
“They manage to be both epic and intimate – in fact, they show those dimensions to be two sides of the same coin. They’ve surprised, moved, challenged and enchanted us. They’ve made us laugh. They’ve grown and deepened when we read them again.”
The 80 works of fiction nominated were all published in the UK in 2014 and voted upon by the 235 writers and critics who constitute the Folio Academy, reported the Irish Times.