the booker prize, how many of them have been readable?

[BigFatCoward]

so some worthy book that i've never heard of just won the booker. is it just me or is it generally won by a torturous book, at best? the only ones i can think of that had genuine broad appeal in my lifetime are the 2 mantel books and vernon god little. the rest i wouldn't read unless i was on a desert island, even the blurbs make them sound overly worth and fucking boring!

[Errant Bard]

How do you know that they are torturous if you never read them?

[polishgenius]

I've barely read any of them, though a couple are on my list (I started Midnight's Children the other day, but then I got distracted by other books), so I can't comment very accurately. I do know that my brother absolutely loved The Luminaries, so I'll be trying that soon.

The White Tiger and Life of Pi are both bang average, though, and I found Remains of the Day too dreary to even get into (which I found a shame because I read Never Let Me Go shortly before and I thought that was amazing.

[Myshkin]

I've never read a Booker winner I didn't like. Hell I've hardly ever read a Booker finalist I didn't like. My favorite Booker winner is probably The God of Small Things by Arundhati Roy. Midnight's Children by Salman Rushdie, The Remains of the Day by Kazuo Ishiguro, The Inheritance of Loss by Kiran Desai, The Blind Assassin by Margaret Atwood, The True History of the Kelly Gang by Peter Carey, Life and Times of Micheal K by J.M. Coetzee, Troubles and The Siege of Krishnapur by J.G. Farrell, and Paddy Clarke Ha Ha Ha by Roddy Doyle are all exceptional novels, while The Sea by John Banville, Life of Pi by Yann Martel, Vernon God Little by D.B.C. Pierre, The Famished Road by Ben Okri, The White Tiger by Aravind Adiga, and Amsterdam by Ian McEwan are all good to great novels. Don't buy into the idea that Booker winners are all boring or pretentious; you'll miss out on some of the world's greatest novels if you do.

[Nearly Headless Ned]

Read a couple of shortlisted and one winner.

The Spy Who Came In From The Cold is an absolute masterpiece. Wolf Hall isn't far off that status either.

Ishiguro's Never Let Me Go is very affecting but could've been even better. I would have preferred a wider look at the society as a whole.

The Sisters Brothers by Patrick Dewitt wasn't half bad either.

Have just started Bring Up The Bodies and so far the writing,characterisation and wit of the first novel is all present and correct.

[snake]

Haven't read a lot of them but the ones I have are all excellent novels. I guess that's why they make the short list. I find that reading them has opened up a great collection of authors that I might not have found otherwise.

[Mark Antony]

Wolf Hall and Bring up the bodies were both fucking awesome. Don't think I've read any other winners :dunno:

[BigFatCoward]

How do you know that they are torturous if you never read them?

started 12 out of the last 30 winners finished 5. i've learned not to bother anymore as they all tended to follow a very similar path, and that is the path that leads to boredom via worthiness and overly flowery prose.

[Larry.]

This year's winner, Richard Flanagan's The Narrow Road to the Deep North, I don't think could be accused of such ;) It would make for a good complement/counterpart to The Bridge on the River Kwai.

[Iskaral Pust]

I really enjoyed The Luminaries. Off the top of my head, I cannot remember that many others that I have read. Life of Pi was pretty good (light and entertaining but without any great substance) and Paddy Clarke was pretty basic to win.

Some others that I've glanced at but not yet picked up to read seemed to have some similarity with a genteel and/or sad tone and purplish prose. But that's very open to sampling error.

I'm going to use this thread for recs and hopefully find some good reads.

[Hos the Hostage]

Wolf Hall and Bring up the bodies were both fucking awesome.

Agree. Waiting for the third.

I liked Midnights children on first read, but didn't want to reread it. I found Life of Pi boring. But I read after watching the movie, maybe that's why.

[Castellan]

They are pretty accessible books and the one I really see as a complete nothing is VernonGod Little.

[Wilbur]

My perception is that many Booker Prize winners are actually more accessible than the books that win some other literary awards.

In fact, some of the Booker Prize winners and shortlisted novels are, in my mind, middlebrow works that ought to appeal to a fairly wide ranging audience; with competent writing, interesting plots, and compelling characters. Some of the books that I would include in this include the following.

- Fire From Heaven, Mary Renault

- The Siege of Krishnapur, JG Farrell

- Earthly Powers, Anthony Burgess

- Empire of the Sun, JG Ballard

- The Old Devils, Kingsley Amis

- The Handmaid's Tale, also The Blind Assassin, Margaret Atwood

- Paddy Clarke Ha Ha Ha, Roddy Doyle

etc.

Of course you do have the real artiste's and their work which is probably too complex and subtle for my taste (hello there, Salman Rushdie!), or the really dull and mannered stuff (greetings, Yann Martel) but not everything the Booker people like is boring and unfathomable.

One thing that I observe is that the Booker people could be sometimes a little insular, and the same authors' names pop up again year after year. It could be that these are just our greatest living writers, or maybe the committee could look outside their own set more often. This may be changing as the rules have been revised to basically include all English language books this year.

[DaveSumm]

I've been meaning to get into more non fantasy stuff so I read Never Let Me Go (not a Booker prize winner admittedly, but the author is and it was a finalist), and it was one of the weakest books I've ever read. I found nothing original about the implausible premise which has been done to death, the writing repetitive and shallow, completely forgettable characters, nothing emotional or poignant about the themes. A massive let down. So I've kinda been put of Booker prize winners/finalists as I was hoping this would provide some quality non-fantasy novels. Am I wrong, is there actually far better books on the list?

[Wilbur]

... there actually far better books on the list?

I agree with you, I don't find Kazuo Ishiguro's books to my taste at all, yet he is a popular writer in literary circles. Perhaps I lack the refined intellect necessary to appreciate those works, but again, like you, I find them to lack novelty of theme or plot or character, and I also agree about the repetition. It just seems like I have already read any Ishiguro book, even when I haven't.

Give me Mary Renault or Margaret Atwood as substitute Booker authors in place of Ishiguro's stuff any day. And yet I have close friends whose minds I respect who really enjoy Ishiguro, so I guess YMMV.

[Myshkin]

I thought Never Let Me Go was a fantastic novel, better even than John Banville's The Sea, which beat it out for the Booker that year.

[DaveSumm]

Perhaps I lack the refined intellect necessary to appreciate those works

I just can't get my head round what anyone could find intellectual about it. I confess I have a general dislike about stories that involve human morality taking a nose dive and us suddenly being fine with such horrific things, but even so, this brought nothing to the table. The entire novel is told from the perspective of someone who finds the whole thing completely normal, and so we learn nothing about anyone's actual attitudes. For all its potentially interesting themes, the book may as well be about an ordinary school, attended by Kathy, her bitchy friend Ruth and her dull friend Tommy. The topic of using humans for other humans use is, essentially, slavery. And there have been infinitely more piercing explorations of it than this. In fact, The Island (pretty poor Ewan McGregor and Scarlett Johannson film with basically the same premise) did more to actually explore the implications. What message are we supposed to take from the book? Kids brought up on an idea will accept it and go along with it? Great. OK. Not once does anyone reflect on why this might be morally reprehensible, instead all we're left with is a brief experiment in making it slightly more humane but ultimately still horrific. To what end? Barely a page went by without the phrase ..., as I said, ... and virtually every remotely interesting plot point was preceded with "...but that was because of what happened next". I'm genuinely curious what I'm missing here, because like you I've seen too much praise for the book to think everyone's just wrong.

[Myshkin]

Ishiguro was not presenting us with a society in flux, where advances in technology were raising complex moral issues; he was presenting an already changed society in which the morality of technology is no longer questioned, even by those negatively affected by it. He does not in the narrative question the morality, rather gently leads us to question it ourselves. He does not ask us to choose sides, only to bear witness. This is why he gives us only the viewpoint of those who have completely accepted their fate. In taking this approach he was able to far more deeply explore his themes, and add significantly to the conversation about morality in technology.

As for his style, everyone has their own tastes. I find his main strength as a writer is in the tone he is able to set, and perfectly control.

[Jo498]

While I didn't finish "Last orders", the book that got Graham Swift the Booker (too much British working class problems/style/milieu I could not connect with at all as someone a generation younger and from another country), I found his earlier "Waterland" extremely captivating and moving. I highly recommend it. (There's even been a movie, with the young Lena Headey, but I have not seen it.)

[Ser Scot A Ellison]

I really enjoyed The Sense of an Ending by Julian Barnes. An evocative book with about a difficult subject.