Irish Writers Sally Rooney and Bernard MacLaverty Make Dublin Literary Award Shortlist

Authors hailing from France, the UK, Pakistan, the USA and Ireland have been nominated for the annual €100,000 prize. The Dublin Literary Award is known for it's unique system of submissions, in which public libraries from around the world nominate titles. The 2019 selections are a prestigious group, with those shortlisted including recipients of the Man Booker Prize, the Woman's Prize for Fiction and the Prix Goncourt.

Irish writers Sally Rooney and Bernard MacLaverty were both nominated this year. Rooney made the list with her debut novel Conversations With Friends and MacLaverty for novel Midwinter Break, named the 2017 Irish novel of the year. They are both excellent contenders. Five Irish writers have previously won the award- the most recent being Kevin Barry's 2013 win for City of Bohane.

The award is organized by Dublin City Libraries and sponsored by Dublin City Council. Lord Mayor Nial Ring announced the shortlist: “This is an award of which I, as Lord Mayor, am extremely proud, and I take every opportunity to talk about it when on my travels, as it is the very centrepiece of Dublin’s designation as a Unesco City of Literature.” He will announce the winner of the award on 12 June.

The rest of the ten nominees are French writer Mathias Énard for Compass, Americans Emily Fridlund for Man Booker prize winning History of Wolves, Emily Ruskovich for Idaho and George Saunders for Lincoln in the Bardo, British novelists Rachel Seiffert for A Boy In Winter and Jon McGregor for Resevoir 13, Pakistani writer Mohsin Hamid for Exit West, and Pakistani-British author Kamila Shamsie for Home Fire. 

Hamid received eleven total nominations this year, the highest of all the entrants, followed by Saunders with nine nominations and McGregor with six.