Shortlist 2012
The shortlist for the 2012 Book Prize can be found below, along with a book club pack for each book. Book club packs contain a fuller synopsis, information about the author, discussion questions, a sample passage and suggested further reading.
Fiction
Our Lady of Alice Bhatti
Mohammed Hanif
Alice Bhatti is an ex-convict nurse with a profound healing ability. Her life is a portrait of the obstacles affecting a Christian woman in Afghanistan, showing the state of the healthcare system and the conditions of working within it. Tied up in a love story with a Muslim man working for a corrupt and violent branch of the police, Alice’s life unravels with drama and unrest. Hanif paints an often dark but compellingly beautiful picture of his country, torn by violence and discrimination.
Perfect People
Peter James
John and Naomi Klaesson have lost their only child. Desperate to be parents again, they search for a way to have a baby free from the hereditary disease they carry. One man can help them: geneticist Dr Dettore, who offers them the chance to alter the genes of their future child. When they arrive at his clinic, the Klaessons realise the process could take them far beyond what they imagined, and they are faced with the decision of how to design their baby and the unforeseen consequences that result. What’s more, Dr Dettore has his own agenda, and his intentions are not what they first seemed.
Merivel: A Man of His Time
Rose Tremain
'Merivel' is the second instalment of Robert Merivel's story, which began in the Booker Prize shortlisted 'Restoration'. Robert Merivel, physician to the king, lives a life of comfort in 17th-century Norfolk. But his years of gallivanting are over, and aged 56 he begins to re-evaluate his life, his work and his loves. Looking for new purpose, he embarks on a journey to the French Court where - in the true style of his character - he runs into nothing but trouble. This is a tale of a comic and tragic midlife crisis told against the bustling backdrop of the early modern period.
Non-fiction
The Hour Between Dog and Wolf
John Coates
What are the effects of the physical responses to risk, loss and gain on the financial market? Neuroscientist and ex-trader John Coates has a theory. In a fictional Wall Street investment bank like the ones that were the setting of Coates’ former career, characters play out the bull market’s run into the credit crunch. In the face of risk their bodies transform, cowering after loss and standing hind-legged, testosterone-ridden and confident after gain. The transformation from confidence to risk aversion, which Coates terms ‘the hour between dog and wolf’, shows the parallels between beast and man and the part they play in the extreme fluctuations of the financial market.
'The Hour Between Dog and Wolf' book club pack [PDF 100KB]
Watch a short film introducing 'The Hour Between Dog and Wolf'
The Train in the Night
Nick Coleman
Imagine how it feels to wake up and realize you have lost your most precious sense, your greatest passion and your livelihood. This is music journalist Nick Coleman’s reality when he suddenly turns half-deaf, losing not only sound but also silence. His extreme tinnitus means everyday sounds of any volume are excruciating and music is completely lacking in coherence. In a moving exploration of an illness and the narrative of a musical life, Coleman tells a funny, heartbreaking story of reliving the past to cope with a changed future.
Circulation
Thomas Wright
This is a biography of the extraordinary William Harvey - arguably the greatest Englishman in the history of science after Isaac Newton - and his revolutionary idea. A brilliant portrait of 17th-century thought and imagination, set amid a pulsating world of blood, war and royal favour. This is the story of how one man, in discovering the circulation of the blood, overturned beliefs that had been held for centuries and presented a radical theory that is still relevant to this day.