Avni Doshi makes it to the Women’s Prize longlist 2021

The Women’s Prize celebrates female writers from around the world, and this year their longlist has books set in the Deep South; Ghana, Hong Kong, Barbados, Brooklyn and even in fantasy lands!

Chair of judges and novelist Bernardine Evaristo, said, "We read so many brilliant novels for this year’s prize and had an energetic judging session where we discussed our passions, opinions and preferences. Sadly, we had to let some very deserving books go but we’re confident that we have chosen sixteen standout novels that represent a truly wide and varied range of fiction by women that reflects multiple perspectives, narrative styles and preoccupations. These novels fascinated, moved, inspired and challenged us and we’re excited at announcing their inclusion on the Women’s Prize longlist."

The other judges are Elizabeth Day, Vick Hope and Sarah-Jane Mee.

Here is the longlist:

A book about the desperate decisions women have to make and the pains and joys of motherhood. Two pregnant women go into a hospital but only one leaves with a baby. We follow their complex lives from that moment onwards.

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A story about the resentment bad parenting brings and how it affects the child. We follow a a daughter whose mother is getting senile and now needs to be taken care of. However, she was wild as young mom and not a very good parent, so her dependency is not welcome news to her daughter.

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We follow two sets of sisters in this novel, Saskia & Jenny and Sara & Mattie. In both pairs one seems typecast as the responsible sister and the other as the flighty one; however when one sister needs another, a lot is revealed. It explores consent from many angles.

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Telling the story of a trans women, Reese, we see how many women long to be mothers. Reese gets a call from her ex who, thinking he was infertile, started an affair with his boss Katrina and now Katrina is pregnant. He asks Reese if she wants to be a mother and raise a child in an unconventional set up.

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This book has an interesting love triangle. Ava, the protagonist, is a young Irish girl teaching English in Hong Kong, in a relationship with Julian who doesn't seem to reciprocate the intensity of her feelings. However Edith, a young lawyer she's falling for does..

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Set in Barbados, this book is darker than the ones before. We follow Lala, a hair braider who is about to give birth and trying to track down her husband when she witnesses a crime that needs to be covered up. With strong themes of poverty, abuse and generational trauma, this book is eye opening.

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This interesting book explores the society's changing norms and lingering evils. The book follows Edie, who is struggling in her career when she meets Eric, a white man who's wife has agreed to an open marriage and needs help doing their adopted black daughters hair. Edie finds herself drawn into the family.

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This interesting novel highlights the absurdity of our times and makes us question what the real world is and what truly has value in our semi digital world.

The book follows a traveller whose videos often go viral and she muses about the web. Suddenly, she gets urgent messages calling her home and is bought back to a seemingly different world than where she's been living in.

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This book ponders over marriage and if it can ever be perfect. The book follows a man who thought he had the perfect marriage, but after his wife dies he questions if he ever knew her at all as he contemplates their life together. This book is intospective yet engaging, a great reflection on life.

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This magical novel follows Piranesi who lives alone in a magical infinite house. He is visited by The Other twice a week as The Other needs help with research into A Great and Secret Knowledge. Piranesi discovers that there's a another person in existance and soon a secret begins to unravel..

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Set in 1957, the book follows a journalist named Jean for whom life seems to have stilled in interesting things, until one case brings her unexpected changes. The case involves a woman who claims to have had a virgin birth and Jean has to uncover if it's a hoax or a miracle.

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Summer is the fourth part of a series, for which each book is named after a season. This book follows Grace Greenlaw, a single mother and former actress who is neighbour to her ex-husband Jeff, as well as their kids Sacha and Robert. We see characters from previous books as well.

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Two women meet on a train and exchange life stories. They end up agreeing to kill each others husbands. We follow one of them, Hannah, a woman who worked hard to get it all and then when she lost it, grew desperate.

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This story follows two sisters. Both grew up in a Southern American black community and one escaped while one stayed. Years later their dauthers meet and between their tales we hear of many generations.

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The book is told from the point of view of Gifty, who is a PHD candidate doing research on mice regarding addiction and drug dependence. She got into the field to understand the opioid addiction that destroyed the life of some of her family but when her mother comes to stay with her- the story of many generations fo her family are revealed.

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This book is a good insight into how oppressive poverty can be. We follow twins Jeanie and Julius who are 51, but live with their mother in a cottage. When she passes away they have to fight to keep everything together.

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