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I've seen some people tweeting the Guardian's Not the Booker prize this year - and as someone who helps put it together each year (with the wonderful @samjordison) I thought I'd clear some things up ahead of the first three books (of six) being announced today.
First off: here is the description of the prize. It hasn't changed the whole time it has run.
"Sam Jordison leads a hunt by readers of the Guardian books blog to find the year's best book, which may – or may not – tally with the assessment of the Booker prize judges."
"Sam Jordison leads a hunt by readers of the Guardian books blog to find the year's best book, which may – or may not – tally with the assessment of the Booker prize judges."
Note the "may - or may not". NtB is literally a test of the annual grumbling that comes with the Booker announcement each year. Y'know, "I wouldn't have chosen that, the Booker judges aren't like regular readers." We're all guilty of it some years.
NtB is a thought experiment: would members of the public come up with something different? The prize for winning is a literal mug (currently stashed in a dusty filing cabinet somewhere in the Guardian). It's not a prize in the sense of £50,000 and guaranteed review coverage.
We do a "longlist" - where people only have to nominate one book, and one vote puts a book in contention. It is usually 100+ books long. And then a shortlist of six is voted for by the public (who get two votes each, but we'll get to that in a bit).
We use the Booker rules for this very reason - to see, when given the same criteria as the Booker judges, would the public do something different? And overwhelmingly that is the case. Booker books definitely don't have an advantage on NtB - in fact, I think readers avoid them.
I've seen some grumbling that Booker authors must get more votes. But there hasn't been a crossover between NtB and the Booker the whole time I've been on the desk. But they must be in contention, because that is the point of NtB - do our readers also love the Booker books?
Tbh I've seen some authors taking NtB very seriously, and publishers too - emailing me because they are worried about their authors' votes, putting 'NtB Winner!' on book jackets. It is sweet, but also - you get some extra book sales from people taking part, and a mug.
If you get nominated on the shortlist, it is probably a sign that people like your writing and that is a nice affirmation. But still, you win a mug. The main reason we run it and enjoy it each year isn't the competition - it is the experiment.
The rules have tweaked over the years, based on reader feedback - there was some frustration when, after a few years of NtB running, we saw authors trying to game it by casting multiple votes on fake accounts. This ended in heartbreak when readers/Sam didn't like the book ...
... the authors became angry and upset because readers weren't positive. They argued that it was unfair because they'd made the list. But they'd often asked their friends and family to vote for them, who then didn't take part at all afterwards. It didn't work for anyone.
So we changed the shortlist rules: the top 3 in the public vote went through, and the other 3 would be picked by: the staff at an indie bookshop, the librarians at a library, and the judges from the previous year's NtB.
This has made for a much more interesting shortlists - the books have been more varied, people have been more satisfied with the quality of the books and we haven't had emails from upset authors, who don't understand why being subject to public scrutiny isn't just free publicity.
Interestingly, none of those groups (public, bookshop, library, last year's judges) know what books the others have selected - and more often than not, they do end up being books the public have also voted for enthusiastically. So it really does work and cuts the gaming.
Anyway - that's everything. I know the six books up this year and it is pretty good. Some surprises. Some books that I know people were very put out about not seeing on the Booker longlist. So let's have fun and read together!
