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This week: How to write like a Booker-nominated author; and we celebrate the World Cup, Father’s Day, and Pride
We’re halfway through June, and summer is settling in here in the Northern Hemisphere. The days are stretching out, World Cup fever has arrived, Father’s Day is just around the corner, and the celebrations of Pride Month continue. If you’re looking for a read to accompany any of these moments, whether that’s a sunny afternoon in the garden or squeezing in a few pages between matches, this edition has plenty of recommendations to keep you company.
Here at Booker HQ, we’re also enjoying a (rare) moment of calm between the announcement of the International Booker Prize winner last month and the reveal of this year’s Booker Prize longlist next month, on Tuesday, 28 July. And it’s got us thinking about where these great books begin. We know that behind every Booker Prize novel are simple routines and rituals that help turn an idea into a story. So, this week, we’ve gathered some tips from 12 of our authors and translators, who reveal how they shape a story from beginning to end. This one is for the writers out there – enjoy!
How to write like a Booker-nominated author
‘A good writer needs a good rubbish bin,’ said Richard Flanagan, speaking backstage at London’s Guildhall after winning the Booker Prize in 2014. ‘I don’t think I’m much of a writer, but I’m a better re-writer,’ he added wryly.
Jokes aside, Flanagan’s sentiment captures something essential about writing life: it is rarely straightforward, but shaped by habit and a constant urge to improve.
Perhaps you are working on your own book and looking for inspiration, or simply curious about how published writers get words on the page. So, if you’ve ever wanted to get inside the mind of a Booker or International Booker Prize-nominated author, you’re in the right place. From silence and structure to cats, coffee and carefully built routines, we’ve gathered 12 pieces of advice from some of fiction’s most acclaimed writers.
Eight Booker-nominated novels with a sporting edge
The World Cup is upon us, and a summer of sport is here, so we’ve rummaged through our shelves to select a range of Booker Prize-nominated novels that capture the highs and lows of life on and off the field, from the thrill of competition to the sanctuary sport offers some people.
Featuring football, golf, squash, cricket, basketball and boxing, this list of books offers a fresh take on sport, whether as a central theme or simply a brief scene. So, as you cheer on your favourite team or sports star this summer, why not pick up one of these novels, too?
The most memorable fictional fathers, ranked from worst to best
The Booker Library has seen more than its fair share of good and bad dads. George Saunders’s 2017 winner Lincoln in the Bardo was about Abraham Lincoln visiting the grave of his son and finding new strength there to take control of the American Civil War. Paul Murray’s The Bee Sting, shortlisted in 2023, featured an Irish family with Father Dickie Barnes at the centre, whose confusions and past betrayals of himself lead everyone around him into danger.
Further back, Marina Warner’s The Lost Father, shortlisted in 1988, shows that even an absent father – in Warner’s novel, the family patriarch died young – can influence the direction of the lives of those left behind.
For Father’s Day, we’ve put together a selection of some of the most striking fathers – the good, the bad and the monstrous – and ranked them, from worst to best.
12 novels for Pride Month
In recent years, the Booker Prize has often been awarded to novels whose central characters are lesbian, gay, bisexual or non-binary. From a lesbian socialist playwright in Girl, Woman, Other to an adolescent described as ‘no right’ in Shuggie Bain, it’s a coincidence that all of these trophy-snatching novels happen to include queer characters, but it also reflects a welcome, growing visibility of LGBTQ+ experiences in new fiction.
Some of these characters proudly declare their sexuality, while others keep it an uncomfortable secret. From newly listed novels to older fiction, the books in this list highlight compelling and unique representations of the struggle for equality and honest expressions of selfhood, capturing a wide spectrum of queer life.
What’s on your reading list this week, book lovers? Let us know what you’re enjoying, and any recent faves in the comments below...
Love the sports article!