awards

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Orange Prize Shortlist

From the longlist of 20 books, today a shortlist of five has been announced, for the 17th annual Orange Prize for women’s writing.

Set up to acknowledge and celebrate women’s contribution to storytelling the Award celebrates excellence, originality and accessibility in women’s writing throughout the world. It is awarded to a novel written by a woman in the English language.

Last year the award was won by Téa Obreht for The Tiger’s Wife and previous winners have included Barbara Kingsolver for The Lacuna, Andrea Levy’s A Small Island and Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie for Half of a Yellow Sun, which is currently being made into a film.

This year the shortlist includes:

Esi Edugyan                 ‘Half Blood Blues’           Canadian      2nd Novel

Anne Enright               ‘The Forgotten’                Irish             5th Novel

Georgina Harding      ‘Painter of Silence’             British         3rd Novel

Madeline Miller         ‘The Song of Achilles’         American      1st Novel

Cynthia Ozick              ‘Foreign Bodies’              American      7th Novel

Ann Patchett              ‘State of Wonder’             American      6th Novel

Short Synopses and Biographies can be read here.

The winner will be announced at an awards ceremony to be held at the Royal Festival Hall in London on 30 May 2012.

I haven’t read any on the list yet, but I have Ann Patchett’s ‘State of Wonder’ on the shelf and I have been eyeing up ‘Half Blood Blues’ for some time.

And you? Have you read any of the titles from either the short or the long list yet, or planning to?

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Liebster Award

During our ‘dizaine de jour’ (12 day) hospital stay, my blog was nominated for a Liebster award by the inspirational Candyce who quit her job to Return To Writing and very kindly wrote a few kind words relating to my book blogging meanderings. Thank you Candyce.

So what is a Liebster? Both a word (German for dearest or beloved) and an honour, it is bestowed by those in the early stages of writing a blog (less than 200 followers) upon 3-5 bloggers they admire.

When nominated we should:

1. Link back to the blogger who awarded us.

2. Tag 3-5 blogs to receive the award.

3. Inform them of their nomination.

4. Display the Liebster Award image on our blog.

Recently I joined the SheWrites community of writers and since then I have had many thoughtful visitors to my blog who continue to leave kind and encouraging comments. So thank you also to all the SheWrite sisters out there, it’s wonderful to be part of the group.

I am enjoying journeying through blogsville connecting with wonderful, inspiring people, admiring the diversity of passionate interests and thought provoking musings of this growing community.

So my nominations are:

  1. The Spirit that Moves Me – A beautiful and insightful blog that uncovers and shares the sacred through creativity and the feminine. In a recent post called ‘Finding home’ she writes “Home is not a cottage, a house, or the city in which I live. It is the moment when I am fully present and fully alive. It is when I am aware of myself and the love that surrounds me, of where I come from and who I am.” I feel right at home with this spirit and happy to be following.
  2.  Speaking of Words and Quilts – Amy has started her blog to record and reflect her writing journey and often uses metaphors relating to her quilt making as well as the magnificent landscape that surrounds her. I’m no quilter, but I love her honest style and the way she finds insightful teachings through her scraps of fabric, even that beautiful, ugly quilt she’s not yet ready to show us.
  3.  Mishfit – Mish is a writer, a Mum and an inspiration to many women in Melbourne, Australia, where she runs a fitness and personal training service for Mums. She is the most knowledgeable person I know regarding female incontinence and can quote scary statistics that will make you take note even if you think that’s not me; most of all she empowers women to get in shape while making the children part of it, – yes, babies have supervised fun too!
  4. Wouldn’t that rip the fork out of your nightie?? – Aria writes from the heart, embracing all of the many aspects of her persona, she is inspirational, intuitive, funny, (whacked in her words), insightful, highly creative and prolific – she wakes at 4am and doesn’t sleep till late and is definitely making the most of those hours. Be careful, you could lose hours on this wonderful blog.
  5. Stories Are Good Medicine – Children’s doctor turned author, Sayantani muses on the writing process, yoga and the dharma, reviews interesting books and offers an alternative perspective. Healthy and thought provoking medicine indeed.