Six Irish authors are among the 137 writers nominated for the world's largest literary prize announced today.
Novelists from 45 countries writing in 15 languages were nominated for the 2008 International Impac Literature Prize, revealed in Dublin today.
Deirdre Ellis King, Dublin City Librarian
Among them was celebrated US author Cormac McCarthy whose novel The Roadwon this year's Pulitzer Prize for fiction. Mr Pipby Lloyd Jones which won the 2007 Commonwealth Writers' Prize is also on the list.
The Irish nominees are: The Boy in the Striped Pyjamasby John Boyne; The Secret Life of E.Robert Pendletonby Michael Collins; This Man and Meby Alison Jameson; Tenderwireby Claire Kilroy; Winterwoodby Patrick McCabe and Zoliby Colum McCann.
Three other nominees with Irish connections are Dane, Christian Jurgensen and English writer David Mitchell, who both live in Ireland; and Canadian Peter Behren whose novel The Law of Dreamsis set during the Famine.
The €100,000 Impac prize which is run by Dublin City Council is unusual in that works are nominated by participating libraries and can be written in any language provided it has also been published in English.
"The spread of cities participating in the nomination process continues to grow. This year, libraries in the cities of Tallinn in Estonia and Lucknow in India put forward nominations for the first time, cementing the competition's status as a truly International Award," said Deirdre Ellis King, Dublin City Librarian.
Some 161 libraries in 121 cities nominated works. The shortlist will be announced on April 2nd 2008 and the prize will be awarded at a ceremony on 12th June.
Previous winners include David Malouf and Colm Toibin.