Chigozie Obioma makes the Man Booker Prize 2015 shortlist

The Fishermen by Nigerian writer Chigozie Obioma and published by One/Pushkin Press has made the shortlist for this year’s Man Booker Prize 2015. Also on the shortlist is A Brief History of Seven Killings by Marlon James.

The Man Booker Prize is one of the richest in the world at US$50,000 with the winner being announced on 13^th October. Some of the previous African winners of the Man Booker prize include Nadine Gordimer for The Conservationist in 1994, J.M. Coetzee twice for Life & Times of Michael K (1983), and Disgraced (1999) and Ben Okri for The Famished Road (1991). The most recent shortlist of an African at these awards was Noviolet Bulawayo for her book We Need New Names.

The full shortlist of six writers chosen by a very famous panel of judges including Ellah Allfrey, Michael Wood (Chair), Professor Emeritus of English and Comparative Literature at Princeton; John Burnside, prize-winning poet; Sam Leith, author and Literary Editor at The Spectator and Frances Osborne, author and biographer is;

• The Fishermen by Chigozie Obioma (Nigeria) One/Pushkin Press.
• Satin Island by Tom McCarthy (UK) Jonathan Cape.
• A Brief History of Seven Killings by Marlon James (Jamaica) Oneworld.
• A Spool of Blue Thread by Anne Tyler (US) Chatto & Windus.
• The Year of the Runaways by Sunjeev Sahota (UK) Picador.
• A Little Life by Hanya Yanagihara (US) Picador.