The Women’s Prize For Fiction (you might remember it as the Baileys Prize) announced its 2018 longlist on International Women’s Day.  Here are the 16 nominated novels:

H(a)ppy by Nicola Barker (William Heinemann)

The Idiot by Elif Batuman (Jonathan Cape)

Three Things About Elsie by Joanna Cannon (The Borough Press)

Miss Burma by Charmaine Craig (Grove Press)

Manhattan Beach by Jennifer Egan (Corsair)

The Mermaid and Mrs Hancock by Imogen Hermes Gowar (Harvill Secker)

Sight by Jessie Greengrass (John Murray)

Eleanor Oliphant is Completely Fine by Gail Honeyman (Harper Collins)

When I Hit You: Or, A Portrait of the Writer as a Young Wife by Meena Kandasamy(Atlantic)

Elmet by Fiona Mozley (John Murray)

The Ministry of Utmost Happiness by Arundhati Roy (Hamish Hamilton)

See What I Have Done by Sarah Schmidt (Tinder Press)

A Boy in Winter by Rachel Seiffert (Virago)

Home Fire by Kamila Shamsie (Bloomsbury)

The Trick to Time by Kit de Waal (Viking)

Sing, Unburied, Sing by Jesmyn Ward (Bloomsbury Circus)

I’ve read 10 of these!  Aren’t I awesome!  (I’ve provided a link to the three novels where I’ve published a review on this blog).  Because I’ve read a significant chunk of the longlist, I’m in a reasonable decision to (a) vouch for the quality and (b) come up with a shortlist.

In regard to the quality the only books I didn’t enjoy are See What I Have Done by Sarah Schmidt (a take on the Lizzy Borden murders that sheds very little light but does expel a great deal of puke) and The Idiot by Elif Batuman (which has a strong first half followed by a plodding second half).

Of the other eight novels – which for me varied from good to bloody brilliant – this would be my shortlist:

Sing, Unburied, Sing by Jesymn Ward

Home Fire by Kamila Shamsie

H(a)ppy by Nicola Barker

Elmet by Fiona Mozley

Manhattan Beach by Jennifer Egan

Eleanor Oliphant is Completely Fine by Gail Honeyman.

Over the next two and a half weeks I intend to the read the other six novels, so that shortlist is likely to be subject to change.