Anna Smaill's debut novel longlisted for Man Booker Prize
The Chimes, by the Victoria MA in Creative Writing graduate, has been longlisted for what is arguably the most prestigious literary prize in the English-speaking world.
Anna Smaill's first novel The Chimes (Sceptre, 2015) has been selected for the Man Booker Prize longlist.
Smaill, a poet, novelist and musician, graduated from Victoria's MA in Creative Writing at the International Institute of Modern Letters in 2001. Her first collection of poetry, The Violinist in Spring , was published by Victoria University Press in 2005.
The Chimes is set in an alternative, medieval-style London where the written word has been banned and life is orchestrated by a vast musical instrument that renders people incapable of forming new memories.
The novel made both the Independent on Sunday and Huffington Post's 'One to Watch' lists for 2015. The Guardian called it 'an engrossing piece of dystopian writing...fresh and original' and it was flagged by the Independent as a contender for 'the novel of 2015.'
Local reviews have been equally enthusiastic, with the New Zealand Herald describing The Chimes as 'a dazzling debut piece of fantasy that marries great writing with compelling narrative'.
The shortlist will be made public on September 15 and the winner will be announced on October 13 in a ceremony at London's Guildhall.
Fellow MA in Creative Writing graduate Eleanor Catton won the 2013 Man Booker Prize for The Luminaries. Lloyd Jones' Mr Pip was shortlisted in 2007, while Kerri Hulme was the first New Zealander to win the Booker Prize for The Bone People in 1985.
Smaill will be our guest at a Writers on Mondays session on 3 August, alongside fellow novelist and current Victoria Writer in Residence Tim Corballis, in a session chaired by Emily Perkins.