This year’s Women’s Prize for Fiction shortlist has been announced, and it includes three first-time novelists.
“The diversity of thought and creativity of women writers at the moment is vast and exciting and inspiring,” said chair of judges Louise Minchin. “The list is eclectic and there are so many different types of stories, and types of voices. For me, it took me to places that I wouldn’t necessarily have gone before.”
The winner of the major UK literary prize, worth £30,000, will be announced on June 14.
The shortlist has been drawing attention for being made up of “older” women – the youngest author is 49 years old.
Michin’s co-judges were novelist Rachel Joyce, writer Bella Mackie, writer Irenosen Okojie and Labour MP Tulip Siddiq. “These shortlisted novels contain exceptionally strong narratives and are compulsively readable,” wrote Joyce in The Guardian. “There is something here for everyone. But trust me: read all six.”
Interested in delving into the shortlisted novels, but unsure which one to pick up first? Here’s what to expect from each of the books.
Black Butterflies by Priscilla Morris
Priscilla Morris’ debut novel Black Butterflies tells the story of painter and teacher Zora who stays in her hometown of Sarajevo as violence takes hold of the city, staying put even as her husband and mother flee to England. She then becomes trapped as the city undergoes the longest siege in modern history, in the midst of the Bosnian war. “It pulses with tension: we couldn’t stop turning the pages,” said Joyce in The Guardian.
“It reads like a straight telling of one woman’s experience and feels totally authentic… Along with human kindness, there is a quiet emphasis on the power of art: Zora’s paintings, like the existence of this book, are testimony to the way that wars come and go but art goes on for ever,” said The Times.
Lecturer and fiction writer Morris has a PhD in Creative Writing from UEA. Her mother is Yugoslavian: “I wrote my debut novel Black Butterflies to understand the siege that devastated my mother’s hometown of Sarajevo from 1992-1996,” she said.
Pod by Laline Paull
Pod is a story about family and sacrifice but told through the eyes of a dolphin. Something terrible happens, and Ea must leave her pod. Then, she has to navigate life in the dangerous ocean alone. “It’s a bold, blistering book that confronts the environmental crisis head on,” said Joyce.
British novelist Laline Paull, who won the Women’s Prize For Fiction in 2015 for her novel The Bees, has had two plays performed at the Royal National Theatre, and is currently adapting The Bees for the stage.
“Laline Paull succeeds splendidly in rising to the most important literary challenge of our time – restoring voice and agency to other-than-human beings,” said Indian writer Amitav Ghosh.
Fire Rush by Jacqueline Crooks
Jacqueline Crooks has drawn on her experience growing up in Southall in London in the 70s and 80s for her debut novel Fire Rush: the story follows Yamaye, a young Black British woman living in London throughout these two decades. She falls in love with a man called Moose, but their relationship is cut short. The upheaval causes her to go on a transformative journey, which is far from easy.
“This is a full-blooded novel of passion and anger with a deep, bassy resonance,” said The Times.
Trespasses by Louise Kennedy
Another first time novelist, Northern Irish author Louise Kennedy worked as a chef for thirty years before turning her hand to writing. She has previously written for The Guardian, The Irish Times, and BBC Radio 4 and published a collection of short stories, The End of the World Is a Cul de Sac, in 2021.
Her first novel is set during the Troubles in Northern Ireland, and tells the story of an affair between 24-year-old Catholic schoolteacher Cushla and married barrister Michael, a Protestant.
“As the novel progresses, it picks up a propulsive energy, the kind that compels you to keep reading straight through to the end. A rising sense of tension throughout comes to a shocking head,” said The New York Times. “It’s a testament to Kennedy’s talents that we come to love and care so much about her characters. And that reading about a long and difficult period from the recent past feels not like history, but like a warning.”
The Marriage Portrait by Maggie O’Farrell
Maggie O’Farrell is no stranger to success: her 2021 novel Hamnet was a Sunday Times No.1 bestseller, and won the Women’s Prize for Fiction in 2020. She has also won the 2010 Costa Novel Award for her novel The Hand That First Held Mine, and she’s been shortlisted for the Costa Novel Award twice since then.
Her latest novel, The Marriage Portrait is a retelling of Robert Browning’s 1842 poem My Last Duchess. The poem is about the fifth Duke of Ferrara who marries young teenager Lucrezia de’ Medici. O’Farrell’s novel, which is also set in Renaissance Italy, focuses on Lucrezia’s short life: at the beginning of the book we learn that she is going to be murdered. Time Magazine listed the novel in its 100 Must-Read Books of 2022.
“Here is a novel inspired by a poem describing a painting portraying a young woman who actually lived,” said The Guardian. “In Maggie O’Farrell’s imagining of 16th-century Italian courtly life, manners make the man, clothes make the woman, and an image is more durable than a person.”
Demon Copperhead by Barbara Kingsolver
Barbara Kingsolver also reimagines a classic in her latest novel, Demon Copperhead, which is her take on David Copperfield. “Of course Barbara Kingsolver would retell Dickens. He has always been her ancestor. Like Dickens, she is unblushingly political and works on a sprawling scale, animating her pages with the presence of seemingly every creeping thing that has ever crept upon the earth,” said The New York Times.
Set in the modern day, this reimagined protagonist, Demon, is born into poverty in Virginia rather than England. He has to brave equally testing circumstances, as he is put through foster care, and overcomes addiction and loss.
“Not one of us could talk about Demon without smacking a hand against our hearts,” said Joyce, while The Guardian said Demon Copperhead “feels in many ways like the book she was born to write”.
The American author has received numerous awards including the UK’s Orange Prize for Fiction 2010, and has been shortlisted for both the Pulitzer Prize and PEN/Faulkner Award.
