Booker Shortlist

Funny old list eh? A bit dry I think - grand, old-fashioned in a way - apart from Ali Smith who is brilliant (although I must admit I haven't read The Accidental yet - I thought Hotel World was wonderful - original and full of lovely use of language and ideas and emotion and ideas. Her short stories are brilliant. I love the one where the man has to buy up all the second hand copies of The Great Gatsby for his sister to make a boat for an installation piece of art. I am yet to read On Beauty so I would hate to comment against Zadie Smith without doing so. I do wonder whether there is a need to rewrite Howard's End? I got funny about Zadie Smith the other day because I read somewhere that she thought English culture was cretinous and base and rubbish (I paraphrase here, obviously). It made me want to go and write a novel full of trips to Great Yarmouth to buy glitter wigs and Gordon the Gophers and eat those brightly coloured rock 'fried breakfasts' and suck those big boiled sweet dummies that make you want to be sick when you go on the waltzers. If that makes sense? These books are very... um... grown up. I don't know. I'm not excited about the list. Ishiguru is good - but I think he wants to be Dickens. When I read When We Were Orphans I thought, 'He's nicked Great Expectations almost completely. There seems to be a real obsession with 19th century writers at the moment - which is funny. It seems British writers are longing for the return of the omincient author once more. I'm not very interested in books that 'tell it like it is,'. I prefer books that tell it like it is for certain people. I don't like authors making comments on society as if they see things others don't...Um... I'm babbling. I haven't ever rated McEwan very much, although I can see he is a deft and well crafted writer. I never feel there is anything of him in it. His books make me think he sits down and thinks, 'Today I will write about a murder,' or 'Today I will write about Terrorism' or 'Today I will write about a stalker'. Disgrace was an unbelievably complex and beguiling book. I suppose the judges judge by previous books too? I liked The Book of Evidence by John Banville, but only because I like to read about murderers from their own point of view. I'd like to think it was Ali Smith's year. Her writing is a breath of fresh air.

'Arthur & George' sounds pretty good, but is waaaay too expensive at the moment. I've heard that Ishiguro has nicked Michael Marshall Smith's 'parts farm' idea from 'Spares', in a more direct way than awful blockbuster 'The Island' has. I've heard a few bits and pieces about the rest, but nothing that really stirs my interest. I'm not sure how I feel about the audacity of calling a book 'The Sea' when there's already a famous 'worthy' book called 'The Sea, The Sea'.

Ooh - well done, Drew. I entered a poem in that competition but didne hear anything. I like Ali Smith too. Hotel World was pretty good but I prefer her short stories. I adore Julian Barnes History of the world in 10 and a half chapters, Also Metroland is great. But I heard him read an extract from Arthur and George and it sent me to sleep so I'm going to steer clear of that. Never read anything by Zadie that I liked. Joe