The International Booker Prize 2025
A Reading Challange
Hello to you all on this fine Thursday,
Just a short note to your inbox to alert you that I will be attempting to complete the International Booker Prize Reading Challenge this year, and I wanted to invite you all to take part in reading all, a few, or even just one of these wonderful translated texts.
For more information on this prize click the link below.
I plan on beginning a reader chat over the weekend to facilitate any discussions about the books as I/ we get through them, and if I’m talking to myself, I think I’m alright with that!
I will be starting with, The Book of Disappearance by Ibtisam Azem, translated from Arabic by Sinan Antoon. I was very lucky to find this in my library’s online e-book collection, I’m not sure if my luck will hold out or if I’m going to have to hunt around for others, but I’m nothing if not determined to get my hands on them all.
The Book of Disappearance Synopsis.
What if all the Palestinians in Israel simply disappeared one day? What would happen next? How would Israelis react? These unsettling questions are posed in Ibtisam Azem’s powerfully imaginative novel
Alaa is haunted by his grandmother’s memories of being displaced from Jaffa and becoming a refugee in her homeland after the Nakba. Ariel, Alaa’s neighbour and friend, is a liberal Zionist, critical of the military occupation of the West Bank and Gaza yet faithful to the project of Israel. When he wakes up one morning to find that all Palestinians have suddenly vanished, Ariel begins searching for clues to the secret of their collective disappearance.
The complete 13 book long-list is as follows:
Reservoir Bitches by Dahlia de la Cerda, translated from Spanish by Heather Cleary and Julia Sanches
Small Boat by Vincent Delecroix, translated from French by Helen Stevenson
Hunchback by Saou Ichikawa, translated from Japanese by Polly Barton
Under the Eye of the Big Bird by Hiromi Kawakami, translated from Japanese by Asa Yoneda
Eurotrash by Christian Kracht, translated from German by Daniel Bowles
Perfection by Vincenzo Latronico, translated from Italian by Sophie Hughes
Heart Lamp by Banu Mushtaq, translated from Kannada by Deepa Bhasthi
On a Woman’s Madness by Astrid Roemer, translated from Dutch by Lucy Scott
A Leopard-Skin Hat by Anne Serre, translated from French by Mark Hutchinson
The Book of Disappearance by Ibtisam Azem, translated from Arabic by Sinan Antoon
On the Calculation of Volume I by Solvej Balle, translated from Danish by Barbara J. Haveland
There’s a Monster Behind the Door by Gaëlle Bélem, translated from French by Karen Fleetwood and Laëtitia Saint-Loubert
Solenoid by Mircea Cărtărescu, translated from Romanian by Sean Cotter
If you plan to take part in this challenge or even if your curiosity is just mildly piqued, let me know in the comments so I can gauge interest.
See you tomorrow for my regular Friday post,
C M Reid and The Ink-Stained Desk