I am awesome. Yup. It’s true. You see, well, I have a new prize. A new award!
Yes, just the other day, I got A Booker Award! Seriously! Me!
What does that mean? Well, it is awarded to a novelist of great achievement from the United Kingdom or from Ireland. Cool! I’ve been to both places. I’m sure that qualifies.
The Man Booker Foundation awards the Booker Prize! But not to me.
Here is what it says on the Man Booker Award site:
Winning the Man Booker Prize is the ultimate accolade for many writers. As 1996 winner Graham Swift commented, “Prizes don’t make writers and writers don’t write to win prizes, but in the near-glut of literary awards now on offer, the Booker remains special. It’s the one which, if we’re completely honest, we most covet.”
Every year the Man Booker Prize winner is guaranteed a huge increase in sales, firstly in hardback and then in paperback. There is spin-off too in global sales of books, in future publishing contracts and in film and TV rights. Besides the fortune, the winner of the Man Booker Prize can also be sure of fame. The announcement of the winner is covered by television, radio and press worldwide.
Isn’t that cool? Won’t it look great on my resume?
Janice, of Aurora Borealis actually nominated me for a Booker Award. Pretty neat huh? Especially since I will be the only novelist to win such a coveted award who has not, um, actually written a novel. But hey, I won two Oscars without ever working on a movie. Apparently I am multi-talented.
Oh wait. I just looked at Janice’s post a little more closely. Oh. My bad. I didn’t win the Man Booker Prize. I won this one:
I got THIS one!
Cool! Sorry for the confusion. (But if you think I’m changing my resume, you’d better think again!)
I am delighted to accept it this award. To do so, I need to
- Thank Janice for the nod. Thanks so much for thinking of me, Janice. For those of you who don’t know her, Janice is an amazingly good person, a writer of poetry, prose, of pieces that make your heart break, and your heart sing. Of pieces that make you question the humanity of some humans, and soar at the gifts others can bring. So thank you Janice. You were one of my first followers. And one of my first and best blogging buddies.
- I need to put a picture of the award on my blog – there it is!
- I need to tell y’all about five books I love. That’s the hard part, because I love books. I read two or three books a week. Whichever one is in my hand is usually high on the list of my favorites – otherwise I would put it down and not bother with it. But I will try to narrow my list. Here are some of my favorites:
Treasure Island by Robert Louis Stephenson is the first book I remember. My sister Beth used to read it to my brother Fred and me every night for years. When I found the old copy of Treasure Island that Beth read from years later, the book fell open to the “Apple Barrel Chapter,” the one we begged for every night. It was through the reading of this that Beth taught Fred and me to love books. Good books. She taught us to love stories and the magic you can always find in them.
Forever by Pete Hamill. A young Irish man travels to America in colonial days. Through an act of kindness, he is granted eternal life as long as he never leaves Manhattan. The story traces the his and the city’s journey from colonial days to the present. Magical. When my sister Beth, who gave me books, was dying, this was the book I read to her in her last hours. It is a beautiful story. I wish I could have read her the whole book.
The Woman in White by Wilke Collins. I’m a sucker for the classics. Wilke Collins was a contemporary of Dickens. He wrote beautifully about different problems in Victorian society, many of which we grapple with today. The Woman in White deals with mental illness. Poor Miss Finch is a blind woman whose life and disability is presented with dignity in a time when that wasn’t often the case in life or in novels. No Name presents two upper class sisters who suddenly learn that by a trick of fate, their parents were somehow not legally married; The Moonstone set the stage for modern mystery stories. He is a writer to check out if you love classic literature. Collins’ protagonists are women and they are true heroines, all.
The Weird Sisters by Eleanor Brown. Weird Sisters is the author’s first novel and it is so incredibly brilliantly (and differently) written. The three sisters are complex and humorous and absolutely delightful, when you don’t want to kill them. Just like real sisters. The book is a gift to anyone with sisters. Or anyone who likes to read. Or maybe just a gift to me.
A Thousand Splendid Suns by Khaled Hosseini. A complex look at the lives of two women in Afghanistan before and during the Taliban’s rule of Kabul.
Ask me again tomorrow and, well, I’ll likely come up with a different group. Because I love books. I just can’t get enough of them.
Lastly, now I need to nominate five bloggers who can lie on their resumes, too. It’s always hard because folks love or hate these awards, or fall somewhere in between, like me. I tried to find folks who like awards and who haven’t yet received this one. This is a challenge, you know!
Speaker 7 of Speaker7
Val of QBG Tilted Tiara
Frank of A Frank Angle
Cooper of Security is for Cadavers
Twin Daddy of Stuph Blog
Lorna of Lorna’s Voice
Totsymae of Totsymae
OK, so I can’t count. Do not feel obligated to accept this award. But I’d love to hear what you all like to read too!
FiftyFourandAHalf 
Congratulations on the award! I’m really jealous that you got a book award without even writing a book.
And thanks for the recommendations. I’ve been such a slug about reading anything lately, but the Weird Sisters looks intriguing.
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The Booker Prize goes nicely with the other awards for my other faux-abilities!
The Weird Sisters is truly one of the best books I’ve ever reaqd. Go for it, Peg!
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Congratulations! You are the best and you deserve this and any other award!
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Oh, thanks, June. You are too kind!
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Thank you for a adding a couple of new titles to my must read list. I’m looking forward to reading them.
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I hope you enjoy them, Michelle. Feel free to add some titles to the list; I’m always looking for a good read. Or a good re-read!
Sorry for my delay in responding to your comment — somehow I missed it!
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OK, I will be sure to check out The Weird Sisters. I’ve always wanted to know what it would be like to have one. I can’t imagine it being weirder than having five brothers.
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It might make you glad you didn’t or sad that you didn’t. Probably both!
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First what a nice prize, you are so deserving! Next, what a great list. Like you, I read constantly and am never without a book. I keep one in the car just in case I get stuck somewhere.
Last, thank you so much. I absolutely will take this one on. I will. Soon, this week.
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Great! I always need good titles!
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I can’t believe you read so many books in a week. Do you sleep? Will have to check some of those recommendations. I feel like I’m always reading kids’ books. 😉
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I cheat, actually. I re-read a fair bit, generally trying to figure out how the author did it.
And I LOVE kids books. Rahl Dahl, C.S. Lewis. The ones you read to your kids count too. They are some of the best. (I’m a huge Harry Potter fan. I can’t believe I left that off my list.)
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Better the Booker Prize than the Man Booker Prize. After all, anybody can write, but it takes REAL skill to live outside the real world.
Or as Adam Savage of Mythbusters says, “I reject your reality, and substitute my own!” 😀
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Oh, I love the Mythbusters!
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Thanks Elyse for the award. I would like to read something good, but at this moment I’m painfully trying to finish Fifty Shades of Grey.
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You’ll finish. And then you deserve to read something good. You can make fun of that, too!
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Congratulations, Elyse!
How do you manage to work, write your blog AND read so many books. I can seem to manage 2 of those 3, but not all 3 at once.
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Thanks, Paprika. Actually my reading has gone down somewhat since I started blogging. And since I started writing, too. Now I swallow a book (to see what happens) and wait a week or so to try to figure out how the author did that. I never figure it out, sadly. Maybe when I do I can write one!
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Congrats Elyse. The Booker will look great between those Oscars and your Nobel prize. Was that for writing or for peace?
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Medicine ;). That’s because I am the best damn fake medical person you’d ever want to have not treat you!
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How could I turn away from an honor like this…especially where books are involved!
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Go for it!
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Congrats Elyse … Many thanks and I humbly accept. After all, I consider it extra special going into this weekend’s celebratory party … which everyone here is invited to attend!
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You’re batting 1,000, right Frank!
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Not yet … but soon 🙂
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Excellent acceptance speech, Elyse! And now I’ve got some more books to add to my ‘What To Read Next List.” So thanks for that!
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I was commenting on your blog as you were doing it on mine. Hope that doesn’t mean I will soon meet a weredeer.
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Since you spend time in the middle of where they like to roam, you just might meet a weredeer
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Actually the were- and regular-deer have eaten everything in sight. So I can no longer hide in the middle of nowhere I am oh so visible in it. Sigh.
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My sister just passed on Weird Sisters to me…glad to know you liked it too.
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It’s brilliant!
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Congrats, Elyse. I’m so impressed. 2 Oscars and a Booker. I hang out with very impressionable bloggers, Um. I meant impressive bloggers. My bad.
Oh and thanks for the nomination. Apparently I can be equally impressionable!
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Sometimes I am impersonable, too. Other times I make up words! Enjoy. This is a fun one, except for trying to narrow down books!
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Very nice, Elyse.
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Thanks Jots!
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I LOVED The Weird Sisters. So glad to see you included that.
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Isn’t it an amazing book? I loved it I have re-read it once already and will do so again. I just loved the POV (trying not to give anything away) and the love/fighting/resolutions. Such a beautiful book!
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Well done for winning the award and good luck in you blogging future!
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Thanks, Grumpy. Although you left such a nice message, I’m not sure that grumpy fits!
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No I only hate inconsiderate or disrespectful people to everyone else I’m nice.
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Good thinking. Although being grumpy has its benefits!
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