US authors Lockwood, Powers, Shipstead up for Booker Prize

FILE - In this Sunday, Oct. 10, 2010 file photo, Damon Galgut with his book 'In a Strange Room' takes part in a photocall on the stage of the Royal Festival Hal in London. Novels that explore historical injustices, the nature of consciousness and the dizzying impact of the internet are among six finalists for the prestigious Booker Prize for fiction. Contenders include Sri Lankan author Anuk Arudpragasams A Passage North, South African writer Damon Galguts The Promise and British/Somali writer Nadifa Mohameds The Fortune Men. The winner will be crowned Nov. 3, 2021 in London. (AP Photo/Kirsty Wigglesworth, file) (Kirsty Wigglesworth, AP2010)

LONDON – Novels that explore historical injustices, the nature of consciousness and the dizzying impact of the internet are among six finalists for the prestigious Booker Prize for fiction.

Three books by American authors are on the shortlist announced Tuesday for the 50,000-pound ($69,000) prize: Patricia Lockwood’s social media-steeped novel ā€œNo One is Talking About This;ā€ Maggie Shipstead’s aviator saga ā€œGreat Circle;ā€ and Richard Powers’ ā€œBewilderment,ā€ the story of an astrobiologist and his neurodivergent son.

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Powers won the Pulitzer Prize for fiction in 2019 for the eco-epic ā€œThe Overstory,ā€ which was also a 2018 Booker Prize finalist.

Three other contenders explore historical traumas. They include Sri Lankan author Anuk Arudpragasam’s tale of war and its aftermath, ā€œA Passage North;ā€ South African writer Damon Galgut’s story of racism and reckoning, ā€œThe Promise;ā€ and British/Somali writer Nadifa Mohamed’s miscarriage-of-justice story ā€œThe Fortune Men,ā€ set among dockers in the 1950s in Cardiff, the capital of Wales.

Historian Maya Jasanoff, who is chairing the judging panel, said the shortlist was immersive, global and ā€œengages with matters of life and death, which feels quite poignant and pertinent in this catastrophic year.ā€

Founded in 1969, the Booker Prize has a reputation for transforming writers’ careers and was originally open to British, Irish and Commonwealth writers. Eligibility was expanded in 2014 to all novels in English published in the U.K.

The judging panel winnowed their list from 158 novels. Some of the highest-profile novels of the year didn’t make the cut, most notably Nobel literature laureate Kazuo Ishiguro’s ā€œKlara and the Sun,ā€ which had featured on the 13-book longlist. Ishiguro is a four-time Booker nominee and won the prize in 1989 for ā€œThe Remains of the Day.ā€

Other highly praised works on the longlist that fell by the wayside include British novelist Francis Spufford’s ā€œLight Perpetualā€ and British/Canadian writer Rachel Cusk’s ā€œSecond Place.ā€

Only one British writer, Mohamed, made the final six, a fact likely to spark debate in the U.K. about whether the prize is becoming U.S.-dominated.

ā€œThe Booker Prize is the great leveler,ā€ said Nigerian writer Chigozie Obioma, one of the judges. ā€œIf we don’t have any British writers, it is just a coincidence. We are not making any statement.ā€

The winner will be crowned Nov. 3 at a ceremony in London.