Byng in war of words with Booker judges after his top choice fails to make longlist

Published on Saturday 2 August 2008 19:51

THE book jackets are off for the literary spat of the year.

Scotland's most high-profile publisher has launched a withering attack on the judges of the prestigious Man Booker Prize.

Canongate's Jamie Byng said he has "no respect" for the selection panel after they failed to include his favoured contender in the longlist for the 50,000 prize.

Byng was infuriated after the committee, which includes former cabinet minister Michael Portillo and broadcaster Hardeep Singh Kohli, overlooked The Spare Room by Helen Garner

Writing to the prize's online forum, the Edinburgh-based publisher said: "I think some excellent books are on the longlist, but I cannot respect a judging committee that decides to pick a book like (Tom Rob Smith's] Child 44, a fairly well-written and well-paced thriller that is no more than that, over novels as exceptional as Helen Garner's The Spare Room or Ross Raisin's God's Country.

"I will declare my bias – as the publisher at Canongate I had a vested interest in seeing The Spare Room make the shortlist. But from an objective point of view this novel has been as well reviewed as any book we have ever published."

Byng states that he has received "remarkable and heartfelt" feedback to the book from a host of other novelists including Peter Carey, Hilary Mantel, Diana Athill and Michel Faber – "anyone of whom I would respect as a judge of serious fiction more than all five of these judges put together."

He added: "One has to be philosophical about these things and as a publisher you come to realise what a lottery these prizes are. I am certain that The Spare Room is a modern classic that will continue to be read and enjoyed and appreciated long after all of us are dead."

The judging panel also includes the respected literary figures Alex Clark, Louise Doughty and James Heneage.

Singh Kohli said: "I can't possibly comment on a competition that it still alive other than to say that I wish that we were celebrating the 13 authors that were longlisted for their achievements."

Portillo declined to comment.

But one member of the judging panel, who declined to be named, said: "There have been e-mail exchanges where he (Byng] claimed that we had not even read the books.

"I put myself under considerable pressure making sure I got every single book read and making a decision that felt impossible.

"I really do not appreciate being undermined in this way."

The inclusion of Smith's Child 44 raised eyebrows as it was the first time a thriller had been included in the longlist.

The well-reviewed book revolves around the hunt for a serial killer and is set in Soviet Russia in the year of Stalin's death.

Scottish author Val McDermid, whose psychological crime novel, A Place Of Execution, came close to making the list a decade ago believes the judges made the correct choice in including Child 44.

"It validates what most of us who read contemporary crime fiction already know, which is that the genre has transformed itself to a point where the best of its output can stand shoulder to shoulder with any other novels."

Crime writer and book reviewer Maxim Jakubowski added: "We have been waiting for years for a thriller to appear on the list. It is totally deserved, though I am surprised because while it is an excellent thriller it is not a particularly literary book."

The Spare Room, by Australian author Garner, tells the story of two 'old bohemians' forced to confront sickness and death. Authors who did make the longlist include Salman Rushdie and Steve Toltz.