to read – Page 85 – What Cathy Read Next…

The announcement of the winner of the Walter Scott Prize for Historical Fiction 2023 on 15th June 2023 at the Borders Book Festival – These Days by Lucy Caldwell – was the final stage in a process that began in August last year when submissions opened.

Over the next few months, books submitted by publishers were whittled down by the judging panel to a longlist of twelve which was announced on 14th February 2023. The books that made the longlist were:

Walter Scott Prize 2023 Longlist — Photo credit: The Walter Scott Prize for Historical Fiction

The Romantic by William Boyd
These Days by Lucy Caldwell
My Name is Yip by Paddy Crewe
The Geometer Lobachevsky by Adrian Duncan
Act of Oblivion by Robert Harris
The Secret Diaries of Charles Ignatius Sancho by Paterson Joseph
The Chosen by Elizabeth Lowry
The Second Sight of Zachary Cloudesley by Sean Lusk
The Sun Walks Down by Fiona McFarlane
Ancestry by Simon Mawer
I Am Not Your Eve by Devika Ponnambalam
The Settlement by Jock Serong

As an avid reader of historical fiction I like to think I have my finger on the pulse but, as usual, the longlist provided some surprises with books I’d not only not read, but never even come across. In fact, I’d only read two of the books that appeared on the list – These Days and The Secret Diaries of Charles Ignatius Sancho. And my attempt to predict the books that might appear on the longlist was pretty much a failure – I only got three right.

I managed to read three more of the longlisted books – The Romantic, I Am Not Your Eve and The Settlement – before the shortlist of seven books was announced on 4th April 2023.

Walter Scott Prize 2023 Shortlist — Photo credit: The Walter Scott Prize for Historical Fiction

These Days by Lucy Caldwell
The Geometer Lobachevsky by Adrian Duncan
Act of Oblivion by Robert Harris
The Chosen by Elizabeth Lowry
The Sun Walks Down by Fiona McFarlane
Ancestry by Simon Mawer
I Am Not Your Eve by Devika Ponnambalam

I managed to read a further three of the books – The Chosen, Ancestry and The Geometer Lobachevsky – before the winner was announced. Based on the books I read, my choice of winner would have been The Chosen. I still hope to get around to reading the two shortlisted books I haven’t read. My attempts to read all the longlisted books in previous years have ended in failure so I won’t even begin to think about trying to do that.

Have you read any of the books on the longlist or shortlist? If so, what was your favourite? And if you managed to read them all – kudos to you, if you did – do you agree with the judges’ decision?

Hosted by Taking on a World of Words, this meme is all about the three Ws:

What are you currently reading?
What did you recently finish reading?
What do you think you’ll read next?

Why not join in too? Leave a comment with your link at Taking on a World of Words and then go blog hopping!

Currently reading

Banyan Moon by Thao Thai (ARC, Quercus)

Ann Tran s already at a crossroads when she gets the call that her beloved grandmother, Minh, has died. Ann has built a seemingly perfect life. She lives in a beautiful lake house and has a charming professor boyfriend, but it all crumbles with one positive pregnancy test.

With both her relationship and her carefully planned future now in question, Ann returns home to Florida to face her estranged mother, Huơng. Under the same roof for the first time in years, mother and daughter must face the simmering questions of their past, while trying to rebuild their relationship without the one person who’s always held them together.

Running parallel to this is Minh’s story, as she goes from a lovestruck teenager living in the shadow of the Vietnam War to a determined young mother immigrating to America in search of a better life for her children. And when Ann makes a shocking discovery in the Banyan House’s attic, long-buried secrets come to light, revealing how decisions Minh made in her youth affected the rest of her life.

The Square of Sevens by Laura Shepherd-Robinson (eARC, Mantle via NetGalley)

‘My father had spelt it out to me. Choice was a luxury I couldn’t afford. This is your story, Red. You must tell it well….’

A girl known only as Red, the daughter of a Cornish fortune-teller, travels with her father making a living predicting fortunes using the ancient method: the Square of Sevens. When her father suddenly dies, Red becomes the ward of a gentleman scholar.

Now raised as a lady amidst the Georgian splendour of Bath, her fortune-telling is a delight to high society, but she cannot ignore the questions that gnaw at her soul: who was her mother? How did she die? And who are the mysterious enemies her father was always terrified would find him?

The pursuit of these mysteries takes her from Cornwall and Bath to London and Devon, from the rough ribaldry of the Bartholemew Fair to the grand houses of two of the most powerful families in England. And while Red’s quest brings her the possibility of great reward, it also leads into her grave danger . . .

Recently finished

The Wall (City of Victory #3) by Adrian Goldsworthy (Head of Zeus)

The Voluble Topsy, 1928-1947 by A. P. Herbert (Handheld Press)

Voices of the Dead (Raven, Fisher & Simpson #4) by Ambrose Parry (Canongate)

What Cathy (will) Read Next

North Woods by Daniel Mason (eARC, John Murray via NetGalley)

When a pair of young lovers abscond from a Puritan colony, little do they know that their humble cabin in the woods will become the home of an extraordinary succession of human and inhuman characters alike.

An English soldier, destined for glory, abandons the battlefields of the New World to devote himself to apples. A pair of spinster twins navigate war and famine, envy and desire. A crime reporter unearths a mass grave – only to discover that the ancient trees refuse to give up their secrets. A lovelorn painter, a sinister conman, a stalking panther, a lusty beetle: as each inhabitant confronts the wonder and mystery around them, they begin to realize that the dark, raucous, beautiful past is very much alive.

Tag: to read

The Walter Scott Prize for Historical Fiction 2023 – My Wrap-Up