Orange Prize Long List

The major international prize for books written by women, the UK’s Orange Prize For Fiction announced their long list of 20 nominees yesterday. Much is being made of the fact that Téa Obreht, whose novel The Tiger’s Wife was released last week to lavish attention, is, at 25, the youngest person on the list.

The prize was created in 1996 by a group of reviewers, librarians, and others in the U.K. book world, who felt that book prizes were disproportionately awarded to men. The Guardian‘s “Books Blog” yesterday addressed the question of whether the Orange Prize is still needed, pointing to recent research that women are still under-represented in literary magazines and criticism.

The full list of nominees is presented in the Guardian slide show, with annotations and  links to reviews. Viewing it can be a bit disconcerting for Americans; the British covers are often quite different from the ones we are familiar with. The UK jacket for The Tiger’s Wife, for instance, actually includes the wife (right, below).

Why is it called the “Orange Prize”? It has nothing to do with Scotland or a the female love of that color; it’s named for the UK mobile network company that funded the launch.

After the jump, the full list of 20 titles, with links to more information about them.

The Orange Prize Long List

Leila Aboulela – Lyrics Alley, Grove, 3/1/11, 9780802119513

Carol Birch – Jamrach’s Menagerie, 6/14/11, 9780385534406

Emma Donoghue – Room, Little, Brown, 9/13/11, 9780316098335

Tishani Doshi – The Pleasure Seekers, Bloomsbury, 8/31/10, 9781608192779

Louise Doughty – Whatever You Love; not published in the U.S.; Faber and Faber in the UK

Jennifer Egan – A Visit from the Goon Squad, Knopf, 6/8/10, 9780307592835

Aminatta Forna – The Memory of Love, Atlantic Monthly, 1/4/11, 9780802119650

Tessa Hadley – The London Train, Harper Perennial, 6/1/11, 9780062011831

Emma Henderson – Grace Williams Says it Loud; not published in the U.S.; Sceptre in the UK

Samantha Hunt – The Seas, 9780312425234, Picador trade pbk reprint, 12/27/05 — published for the first time this year in the UK, after the author’s first book, The Invention of Everything Else was shortlisted for an earlier Orange Prize.

Joanna Kavenna – The Birth of Love, Metropolitan Books, 4/13/10, 9780805091540

Nicole Krauss – Great House, Norton, 10/12/2010, 9780393079982

Wendy Law-Yone – The Road to Wanting; not published in the U.S.; Chatto & Windus in the UK

Téa Obreht – The Tiger’s Wife, Random, 3/8/11, 9780385343831

Julie Orringer – The Invisible Bridge, Knopf, 5/4/10, 9781400041169

Anne Peile – Repeat it Today with Tears, Serpent’s Tail, 8/1/11, 9781846687471

Karen Russell – Swamplandia!, Knopf, 2/1/11, 9780307263995

Lola Shoneyin – The Secret Lives of Baba Segi’s Wives, 7/1/10, 9780061946370

Roma Tearne – The Swimmer; not published in the U.S.; Harper in the UK

Kathleen Winter – Annabel, 1/4/11, Grove Press, 9780802170828

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