The Booker shortlist honors authors 'in total command' of their craft

"The 2025 Booker shortlist is made up of works by veteran authors, most of whom have more than five books to their name. In a statement, author Roddy Doyle, the chair of judges, writes that the shortlisters are "in total command of their own store of English, their own rhythm, their own expertise." Each of the six shortlisted authors receives 2,500 ($3,380) and "a specially bound edition of their book." The Booker Prize winner will be announced Monday, Nov. 10, in a ceremony that will be broadcast on BBC Radio 4 and livestreamed on the Booker Prizes' social channels. The winner will receive 50,000 ($67,600)."

"Audition by Katie Kitamura Kitamura told NPR she got the idea for Audition from a headline that read "A stranger told me he was my son." She said she" was completely captivated by the idea that in a single encounter, in a single moment, everything you understand about yourself and your place in the world could be overturned." A live-action movie adaptation of Audition will star Lucy Liu and Charles Melton."

The 2025 Booker Prize shortlist features six veteran novelists, most with more than five books to their name. Roddy Doyle, chair of judges, describes the shortlisters as "in total command of their own store of English, their own rhythm, their own expertise." Each shortlisted author receives 2,500 ($3,380) and a specially bound edition; the winner, to be announced Nov. 10 and broadcast on BBC Radio 4 and livestreamed, will receive 50,000 ($67,600). Shortlisted works named include Flashlight (Susan Choi), whose sixth novel began as a New Yorker short story and draws on Choi's Midwestern Korean-Russian-Jewish upbringing; The Loneliness of Sonia and Sunny (Kiran Desai), written over nearly 20 years and described as "a magical realist fable within a social novel within a love story"; Audition (Katie Kitamura), inspired by a headline and slated for a live-action film; and The Rest of Our Lives (Ben Markovits), noted by judges as a "remarkably satisfying road trip".

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