If you’re looking for me over the next few weeks, I’ll give you a major clue as to where I’ll be: with my face pressed down into one of five heavy books, making my way through the delicious words of Nicole Krauss, Helen Simonson, Emma Donoghue, Tom McCarthy and Peter Geye.
Yes, friends, it’s time of the inaugural Indie Lit Awards — and I’m sittin’ pretty as one of the judges on the literary fiction panel. As such, I’m spending an inordinate amount of time with five books and working with an awesome crew of folks to determine a winner. And that’ll be a surprise to all of us.
Check out the novels culled from nominations made by independent lit book bloggers (maybe yourself?), and feel free to read along with us. Panelists are all busy reading now, and winners in each category will be announced in February. Look for my personal reviews in coming weeks!
2010 Short List for Literary Fiction
• C by Tom McCarthy
• Great House by Nicole Krauss
• Major Pettigrew’s Last Stand by Helen Simonson
• Room by Emma Donoghue
• Safe from the Sea by Peter Geye
2010 Shortlist for GLBTQ
• Annabel by Kathleen Winter
• Jumpstart the World by Catherine Ryan Hyde
• Krakow Melt by Daniel Allen Cox
• Will Grayson, Will Grayson by David Levithan and John Green
• Scars by Cheryl Rainfield
2010 Short List for Non-Fiction
• The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks by Rebecca Skloot
• The Warmth of Other Suns by Isabel Wilkerson
• Let’s Take the Long Way Home by Gail Caldwell
• Cleopatra: A Life by Stacy Schiff
• At Home by Bill Bryson
2010 Shortlist for Speculative Fiction
• Monsters of Men by Patrick Ness
• Kraken by China Mieville
• Dante’s Journey by JC Marino
• How to Live Safely in a Science Fictional Universe by Charles Yu
• The Passage by Justin Cronin
write meg! 
Have fun with this. You are reading a great list. Can’t wait to see the results.
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My vote is for Helen Simonson. I absolutely adored Major Pettigrew’s Last Stand. Have fun Meg.
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I’m knee deep in The Passage right now and I cannot put it down – good luck 🙂
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Wow, there’s some good stuff here. I just finished Great House, and was completely enthralled. It was dark, intense, and so psychologically interesting. I loved the way she used the desk as a focal point to draw all these people together.
Major Pettigrew was a real favorite of mine in 2010. As was Let’s Take the Long Way Home – an extraordinary memoir of friendship and animals.
Have fun, and good luck choosing a winner!
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My two favorites from those lists from last year were Safe from the Sea and The Passage.
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You’ll be a great judge!
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That’s a great list of books! I’ve only read one of them – Monsters of Men – but if that’s the level quality we’re talking about here, I definitely need to read more of them.
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Have so much fun, Meg. Sounds wonderful, and the books look great! xoxo
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I’m currently reading How to Live Safely in a Science Fictional Universe and … well… it’s difficult to describe. I got about 40 pages in and said, Huh? I read a lot of scifi but I was lost. Since I really wanted to like this book I actually started over and paid more attention and I think now I get it. Maybe 75%. Anyway, I’ll be watching for your take on it.
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I’ve been enjoying the reading. I am almost through with C and then I will move onto Room, which is the last book for me. I sort of lucked out with this list because all of these books were books that I wanted to read at some point anyway.
It will be interesting to see which one turns out to be the winner. They are all so different.
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