The Women’s Prize for Fiction unveiled its longlist of 16 books, with Maggie Shipstead, Dawnie Walton, and Louise Erdrich among the authors in contention for the British literary prize.
Shipstead was nominated for Great Circle, her novel about a female aviator and the actor hired to portray her in a film 100 years later. The book was previously shortlisted for the Booker Prize.
Walton made the longlist for her debut novel, The Final Revival of Opal & Nev, which is also a finalist for this year’s Aspen Words Literary Prize. Erdrich was nominated for her latest novel, The Sentence.
Ruth Ozeki earned a nomination for The Book of Form and Emptiness, while Elif Shafak was longlisted for The Island of Missing Trees. Charlotte Mendelson was nominated for The Exhibitionist; she made the shortlist for the prize in 2008 for When We Were Bad.
The other finalists are Build Your House Around My Body by Violet Kupersmith, Careless by Kirsty Capes, Creatures of Passage by Morowa Yejidé, Flamingo by Rachel Elliott, Remote Sympathy by Catherine Chidgey, Salt Lick by Lulu Allison, Sorrow and Bliss by Meg Mason, The Bread the Devil Knead by Lisa Allen-Agostini, The Paper Palace by Miranda Cowley Heller, and This One Sky Day by Leone Ross.
The Women’s Prize was established in 1996. Previous winners include Ann Patchett for Bel Canto and Susanna Clarke for Piranesi.
The shortlist for this year’s award will be revealed on April 27, with the winner announced on June 15.
Michael Schaub is a Texas-based journalist and regular contributor to NPR.
