Man Booker International Prize 2019 Shadow Panel winner

Posted on May 21, 2019 by WordsAndPeace

#MBI2019

Man Booker International Prize 2019 Shadow Panel winner

Finally, the day has come to discover the 2019 Man Booker International Prize.
This has been a wonderful experience for me, reading 12 books from all over the world, even though a few were quite awful, according to me. BUT some were also amazing.
As a reminder, here is where things were at the level of the shortlist:

And our Shadow Panel has voted and our winner is:

Personally, I would choose another winner:

I’ll add here the official winner in the afternoon: it’ll be chosen in the evening in London, you can watch the event live here.

DID YOU READ THESE TITLES?
WHICH ONE WOULD BE YOUR WINNER?

Man Booker International Prize 2019 Shadow Panel shortlist

Posted on April 18, 2019 by WordsAndPeace

#MBI2019

Man Booker International Prize 2019 Shadow Panel shortlist

This year, our Shadow Panel counts 11 judges. Everyone worked really hard and most judges read most of the 13 books featured on the longlist.
Here is the shortlist our Shadow Panel came up with:

As you can see, our Shadow Panel shortlist has 5 books in common with the official shortlist – just as mine also had 5 in common with the official list, but with a different 6th title.

This is all pretty similar.
This is probably due to the fact that the longlist was rather weak this year, without too many outstanding titles.
And as most the books were very fairly short, our team of judges managed to read a lot. I’m amazed I personally managed to read 12, in so few weeks.
“Every book was read by at least 8 judges, and most by at least ten (Drive Your Plow Over the Bones of the Dead was the only one with everyone’s score).

What next?
Our winner will be announced on May 21, a few hours before the official winner is announced.
NB: the book I would pick as the winner is on the official shortlist and the Shadow Panel shortlist!

If you want more details, come this way to read our chairman’s post.

DID YOU READ THESE TITLES?
WHICH ONE WOULD BE YOUR WINNER?

2019: March wrap-up

Posted on April 1, 2019 by WordsAndPeace

MARCH WRAP-UP

I could start this recap with the exact same line as the last 3 or 4 months: it is still too cold around Chicago, and believe or not, we had a bit of snow Saturday evening and night!
But who cares when you have lots of books waiting for you to read? That has definitely been the case for me, as I’m part of the Shadow Panel for the Man Booker International 2019. The shortlist will be revealed on April 9, and I still have quite a few to read to get closer to the 1 titles…

Also, slowly but surely, I’m still reading Don Quixote, now with Lory at The Emerald City. We will take turn to post our reflections/questions on the second part of the work.

Everyday, I also read a chapter of Les Misérables in French, a read-along with one my students. We are now in volume 2.

So here is what I finished in March:

11 books:
1 in print
= with 2,964 pages, an average of 95 pages/day
None in audio
I have been listening to Walden, by Thoreau, but have not finished yet.

5 in literary fiction: