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Thanks for the heads-up Tony. QC Fiction is on the radar :-) !

But thanks, and please do point out any books/publishers that you think might be under our radar so we can confirm.

Five more eligible titles as of late. I thought Sudden Death (Alvaro Enrigue, trans. Natasha Wimmer) and Moonstone (Sjon/Victoria Cribb) were both excellent. Thanks to everyone recommending Moonstone on here; it's a book I was hesitant to pick up for some reason, so I'm glad people here were talking it up a bit.

Iza's Ballad (Magda Szabo/George Szirtes) and The Last Wolf/Herman (Laszlo Krasznahorkai/George Szirtes/John Batki) were both decent reads, but neither lived up to other books I've read by those authors.

And last but least, Revulsion by Horacio Castellanos Moya/Lee Klein. I didn't care for this one at all, which was a bummer. I really enjoyed Castellanos Moya's Senselessness and The Dream of my Return.

So yeah, it was good to finally read a few books I really enjoyed, looking forward to tackling a few more before list announcement time.

So where have I been? Still reading translations of fiction from Arabic. Still furious that large segments of the US have decided that anyone who is an Arabic speaker, or from largely Muslim countries is a terrorist. So I just keep reading Arabic translations. By now I've read every book translated into English published anywhere from 2014 to the end of last year, and I intend to just keep going. I've got another 150 books lined up.

Trevor, I was reminded yesterday when checking blogs for MBI prospects that a couple of them (Winstonsdad and Tony's Reading List) review quite a lot from two small presses that are ineligible for the MBI due to being primarily based outside the UK, World Editions (Netherlands), and Small Stations (Bulgaria). (Another I'd not heard of previously was Milet (US).) It's probably a bit late now if they haven't been included in BTBA considerations but seemed worth mentioning.

Dan wrote: "Both Han Kang's The Vegetarian and Stefan Hertmans' War & Turpentine among NYT's five best novels of 2016."

The blurb for War & Turpentine makes it sound like a memoir, and until your post I assumed it was one. Thanks for the heads up. Someone I follow on GR has just given it another 5* rating.

Antonomasia wrote: "The blurb for War & Turpentine makes it sound like a memoir, and until your post I assumed it was one."

I tend not to concern myself about whether books are novels, autobiographies, or memoirs, or more likely combinations of all three. Regardless of how War & Turpentine is classified, it's at least partially fiction and it's all very, very well done.

Just a few questions about the workings of the BTBA judging (looking at you here, Trevor).

1. How much do other awards, like the Booker International, impact decision making? Are judges looking toward those announcement lists to make sure there isn't too much overlap? Concerns over putting too many books from last year's longlist on there - ie is Ladivine or The Vegetarian old news?

2. What do you do with Schmidt's Bottom's Dream? There's no way anyone could give that the attention it would need while leaving room for the other 100 or so novels one would be responsible for judging as well.

3. Are there any announcement dates yet? That one's the easy one for you, sir. Now, get back to reading.

The announcement dates are , assuming no last-minute change:
Longlist 28th March
Shortlist 18th April
Winner 9th May
(all Tuesdays)

That would have to be some super-speed reading to finish the whole longlist in three weeks, more than a book a day, and doubtless several doorstoppers in the mix.

Yes, it requires making good predicitions in advance so that one can start early.

I don't the answer to your first two questions, Eric (sorry I first said Dan!), but I can say that in our deliberations to date no one has ever brought up a book taking another prize. I don't think that will come to play, either. If we like a book, I think we'll want to put it on our list! I'll be curious to see if that enters the mix, though.

As for Bottom's Dream, I can't say quite where that will end up, either. I'm excited to know myself!

Sorry! I know that's not helpful, but at least Anto got you the dates :-)

Thanks to both of you. Not sure why I didn't think the dates were posted yet...

And I was just curious, Trevor, so thanks for the responses. Obviously I wasn't looking for hints as to what's got a shot to make it, just about the general process.

All good, Eric! I'm happy to elucidate as much as I can!

It's also fun to hear what people are curious about!

The one that has always intrigued me is whether every judge reads every book or not. That seems usual practice on awards but a tough ask if you accept 400+ books for consideration.

The answer there is no. But every book is read by a judge. Chad has been open about this part of the process so I don't think he'd mind if I share that here.

Nerding out here and starting to put a list of possible contenders together. The 25 title longlist is next to impossible to nail down, so I like to focus on the shortlist. I feel like I'm really in the dark this year, so I'm extra curious to see other peoples' guesses. From what I've read, I feel good about Sudden Death and Moonstone. That's about it. Last year I'd read 8 that I put on there (3 made it on the actual shortlist, 4 others on the longlist). I've got other guesses as well, but it's not as fun with books I haven't read. My goal this year is the same as the last few, to have read at least 5 of the shortlisted titles before the prize is awarded, so I've potentially got some reading to do ahead of me.

I'm excited to read these! Please do contribute your guesses :-)

I remember last year Chad did one of his 20 clues to the shortlist things where he gave so much information that it felt like one could almost deduce the list, or large parts of it.

Unfortunately one of his clues was rather misleading which threw the whole thing: if I recall correctly, because he had "Mexican" as a distinct language from Spanish.

What would make guessing games easier / more fun would be the eligibility list.

From the threepercent website's translation database (), which I thought was essentially the official list, the 2016 sheet doesn't seem to have been updated since 2015. Or does one need to go into the Complete Translation Database and filter out the 2016 books?

With a Han Kang, a Bae Suah, and two Moon Jung-Young novels on the eligibility list, and two star-translators in Deborah Smith and Jung Yewon, I shall personally be very disappointed if K-lit isn't well represented.

I worked off the 2016 database and thought it looked pretty updated. It's fairly fun working off a database of a few hundred books, but I always appreciate when he offers clues. No reason you can't make guesses twice once he offers them up.

And Trevor, I'll offer up more guesses as the longlist date approaches and/or I read a few more books.

Lastly, how many books has everyone read off the 2016 list? A whopping 11 for me.

I read The Vegetarian, and wasn't overly impressed (though I wouldn't be floored or disappointed to see it longlisted), and have Bae Suah's novel on loan from the library. Not sure I'll get to it before the end of the month, but I'll absolutely read it should it make the list of 25.

Moonstone, Chronicle of the Murdered House, Han Kang... isn't at least one Krasznahorkai eligible? Those are my definites.

The 2016 list for some reason says last updated 2015, but that's not true. I don't know if it's the same exact list we've been updating throughout the competition, but it should give a pretty good idea.

Krasznahorkai's The Last Wolf & Herman is eligible.

Chronicle of the Murdered House is definitely one I'm interested in, but it's got a few things working against it as far as me reading it shortly. It's not in my library system, it's long, and I'm currently reading Faulkner, and my impression is that Cardoso owes a lot to him (does it?). Should it make it to the shortlist, I'm on it.

And the Krasznahorkai also left me unimpressed. Much like The Vegetarian, I found it good, not great. Another title I'd neither bet for nor against on the longlist, but definitely not on the shortlist.

Eric wrote: "No reason you can't make guesses twice once he offers them up."

It was, now, I think about it, the shortlist last year. Given it is 10 books from 25 (or something like that) given enough clues you should have a decent chance of working it out. But last year I realised that there seemed to be no combination that worked. After the event Chad admitted that - he even offered to send me part of the prize he offers each year when I pointed out that it was impossible to win, but I graciously declined!

Eric wrote: "Chronicle of the Murdered House is definitely one I'm interested in, but it's got a few things working against it as far as me reading it shortly. It's not in my library system, it's long, and I'm ..."

It's long, but a much quicker read than Faulkner.

Micheal Orthofer has a wonderful, lengthy post of speculation about this year's BTBA! .

I hope you'll all take a moment to read it and share your thoughts here! Where's he in alignment with your predictions? Where is he out on a limb? What are your hopes?

I want to hear, though I won't be able to participate much :-)

. (Thanks to Nathan elsewhere on GR for drawing attention to this.)

Includes the following paragraph: Arguably, this is the easiest BTBA to date, with one contender towering over everything else: it seems almost inconceivable that John E. Woods' translation of Arno Schmidt's Bottom's Dream wouldn't be the winner. So much more, in every respect, than any of the other eligible titles, how could it not win ? I mean, they might as well announce it on 28 March and then make the rest of this year's BTBA a contest to pick a runner-up from the 24 remaining longlisted titles .....
Oh, yes, well ... maybe not ? One can't help but notice that Bottom's Dream didn't even get longlisted for the 2017 PEN Translation Prize ..... (Of course, we don't know if it was even considered -- unlike the BTBA, they don't reveal which titles have been submitted; with the BTBA that's not an issue: they all are, automatically (indeed, whether they like it or not ...) !) And, of course, there's the issue that it's unlikely all (or, actually, any) of the judges have made it through the whole damn thing (I haven't either). And there's the argument that this is too out there, too heavyweight (in every respect) a title to burden readers with, and that the BTBA should try to honor something a bit more accessible (you know, like some Krasznahorkai ...).

I'm going to be a bit controversial here (at least this would be controversial with some people I know on GR, albeit mostly not regular posters to the group) and suggest that if very highbrow and serious readers such as Orthofer, and a few other people I'm aware of online, still haven't finished this book that's been out for months, perhaps that does mean it shouldn't win. Raises a question of what novels are for when things get to this level. Where to set the bar?

It's evidently a sort of abstract art more than a novel as most think of it, and I know I don't have the appetite for that type of thing much over 150pp. But some people revel in 1500.

I'm going to post the following question elsewhere too, but how does it compare as a reading experience with, say Finnegan's Wake, for anyone who's read at least part of both?
I'm pretty sure I've noticed people on GR finish FW a lot more quickly than that.

The other thing is that I can see that with a subset of readers (a small subset but one I see quite a bit from on GR, it might affect the credibility of the BTBA as the one award worth the time of those with a taste for the most highbrow experimental doorstoppers. Yet many others (far more in number) would never even bother to start Bottom's Dream.

I predict the first ever dual winner: to Schmidt and jointly to something marginally more conventional.

I've read at least a large portion of both (and named my site and this group after FW!), and I found FW easier going. BD is a work of art for sure, and the beautiful complexity to be found in all of the columns and marginalia working together to create word puzzles inside word puzzles boggles the mind. I am amazed (meaning that word literally and not at all the way we use it in typical speech) at Wood's translation, which is a suitable life's work for most people!

While I say all of that, I think your questions are valid and important!

Interesting!

And I guess it goes without saying you'd have to keep mum on the idea of two joint winners...

I have to say my reaction to Michael O's post was the same as Antonomasia's, indeed I was going to make a perhaps more controversial point to provoke discussion.

It would seem a tad ridiculous to award a prize to a book that the most avid Schmidt fan (he has even written a book on the author) admits to not having finished yet and one which is going to price out many readers from even buying it. Awards to me ultimately serve promote reading, readalongs etc and giving the BTBA to such a book would rather defeat the purpose. To me giving it the prize is what would hit the BTBA's credibility not omitting it.

By all means give John Woods a BTBA special achievement award but I will be disappointed if it even makes the shortlist.

I'm having versions of this conversation in two different places on GR, so apologies to the handful of people who see both - but it does seem like an oversight that Woods wasn't even on the PEN Translation longlist. That's explicitly a prize for a translation. The BTBA less so.

Where is the other conversation going on, Anto? I want to check it out!

It's not exactly a long discussion, but here:
/user_status...
(Have checked with thread owner before linking.)

Thanks!

So the BTBA will lose credibility by not listing the book or lose credibility by listing the book :-)

Trevor wrote:
So the BTBA will lose credibility by not listing the book or lose credibility by listing the book :-)"

Good luck with that! Fingers crossed the BTBA doesn't die under your watch.

I agree it was a big omission from the PEN awards.

By the way, I've been authorized to let you all know that the longlist has been settled. It was settled before Michael's post and before this back and forth about Bottom's Dream, so you can at least rest assured none of this pressures is one way or the other!

But now that it's settled, I hope for some serious speculation! In it's your friends!

Trevor wrote: "I've been authorized to let you all know that the longlist has been settled. It was settled before Michael's post and before this back and forth about Bottom's Dream, so you can at least rest assured none of this pressures is one way or the other!"

Cool! Quite a while to wait before the official announcement. But that gives you guys all the more time to re-read 25 books...

Time for another question. I've just about finished Cockroaches by Scholastique Mukasonga. It's listed on the database, but as a pretty straight forward memoir, is it eligible?

I'll just say that that's a debate we had amongst ourselves, Eric. It was never deemed officially ineligible, so we had to figure out what we thought about its eligibility as well as what we thought of the book!

I think Chad will start posting his hints next week, along with his offer of a life-time supply of Open Letter Books to anyone who gets all 25!

He's told me that as long as I don't name any of the books (which I wouldn't do) he's okay with me driving some speculation.

That said, I don't want to undercut his future posts or make it easier for someone to get all 25 (though I'd love it if someone here won that!), so mostly what I may do is be unhelpfully vague in an effort to get you all to discuss!

And, Anto, we will need the time! There are a couple of long books involved, as you anticipated a few weeks ago! There are also a handful of bite-sized books. (I didn't do the math here, so "a couple" to me means more than one, and a handful means the same thing but probably at least one more shortish book than long book in the mix).

Thanks for that, Trevor. I really enjoy the award (the fact that EVERYTHING is eligible makes it fun to prep all year round for it), and the insight is always fun to hear.

I'll start sharing guesses soon. I'll probably parse them out to give myself more time to ponder.

Eric wrote: "Trevor wrote:
So the BTBA will lose credibility by not listing the book or lose credibility by listing the book :-)"

Good luck with that! Fingers crossed the BTBA doesn't die under your watch."

Ha! Well, we are trying to find the next Nobel-worthy songwriter, so!

Great, now I have to factor that in as well. Did R Kelly even put out an album last year?

First five guesses:
Sudden Death - Alvaro Enrigue (Natasha Wimmer)
Moonstone - Sjon (Victoria Cribb)
Chronicle of the Murdered House - Lucio Cardoso (Margaret Jull Costa/Robin Patterson)
The Heart - Maylis de Kerangal (Sam Taylor)
On the Edge - Rafael Chirbes (Margaret Jull Costa)

I've only read the first two. The other three I'm interested in checking out at some time.

Eric wrote: "First five guesses:
Sudden Death - Alvaro Enrigue (Natasha Wimmer)
Moonstone - Sjon (Victoria Cribb)
Chronicle of the Murdered House - Lucio Cardoso (Margaret Jull Costa/Robin Patterson)
The Heart ..."

If there are any clues about the same translator appearing twice, surely Jull Costa is a shoo-in.

Just on books I'm considering, Megan McDowell, George Szirtes, Deborah Smith and Jordan Stump all also show up multiple times. I've got Margeret Jull Costa on there three times.

Antonomasia wrote: "If there are any clues about the same translator appearing twice, surely Jull Costa is a shoo-in"

Although if only twice then two of Vila-Matis, Cardoso, Chirbes and Marias has missed out - they all look strong contenders to me.

I once tried to count the number of Jull Costa books I have read and got to well over 30 and lost count - she is certainly my most read author by a long long way.

Perhaps as well as a special prize for Bottom's Dream, there should be a special one for best book translated by Margaret Jull Costa.

Paul's count is correct: Jull Costa has translated four eligible books this year, and he's equally correct that all are strong contenders. Perhaps surprisingly (surprised me, anyway) by my count she's only showed up on the BTBA longlist three four times (2009 for Saramago's Death with Interruptions, 2014 for Marias's The Infatuations, and 2015 for both Giralt Torrente's Paris and Fraile's Things Look Different in the Light (which was eventually shortlisted)).

I need to run down all of the books she's published since the BTBA came into existence to see if I think she's been shorted. Certainly a lot of her most famous translations were done before.