The longlist of finalists for the first Dylan Thomas Prize, to be awarded biennially for a book of poetry, fiction, or creative nonfiction by a writer under thirty, was recently announced in the late poet's hometown of Swansea, England.
The winner, to be chosen on October 27, will receive £60,000 (approximately $110,000). The finalists are:
Susan Barker for Sayonara Bar (Black Swan, 2006)
Lucy Caldwell for Where They Were Missed (Viking, 2006)
Kira Cochrane for Escape Routes for Beginners (Pocket Books, 2005)
Rodge Glass for No Fireworks (Faber and Faber, 2005)
Joey Goebel for Turture the Artist (MacAdam/Cage, 2004)
Ian Holding for Unfeeling (Scribner, 2005)
Nick Laird for Utterly Monkey (Fourth Estate, 2005) and To a Fault (Faber and Faber, 2005)
Emily Maguire for Taming the Beast (Serpent's Tail, 2005)
Matthew David Scott for Playing Mercy (Parthian, 2005)
James Scudamore for The Amnesia Clinic (Harvill Secker, 2006)
Talitha Stevenson for Exposure (Harcourt, 2005)
Rachel Tresize for Fresh Apples (Parthian, 2006)
Liza Ward for Outside Valentine (Henry Holt, 2004)
The award, sponsored by the Dylan Thomas Centre, was launched at a ceremony in 2004, on the anniversary of Dylan Thomas's birth. Actress Catherine Zeta Jones, the award's international embassador, said the prize had been created in recognition of "the way in which [Thomas's] youthful talent was nurtured in his native city of Swansea."
