The 2023 Booker Prize will be announced today at 3 p.m. (Central Standard Time) or 9 p.m. (UK time). You can watch the ceremony live on YouTube.

And what could be more fun than watching a bunch of writers gossip, nibble banquet food, and drink inexpensive wine or water, while they are mentally practicing their witty, charming, or possibly earnest acceptance speeches? Are they nervous or relaxed? Let us hope the latter.

Query:  Why is the the Booker announced on a Sunday and why so late in the year?  Hypothesis:  Christmas shopping. I am not adverse to rushing  to a bookstore to buy the winner or a runner-up.  N.B. We in the U.S. have missed Black Friday and Small Business Saturday deals, though. Couldn’t it have been announced on Wednesday or Thursday?

Query:  What do writers wear to awards ceremonies?  Do they get dressed up in sparkly gowns and tuxedos, or wear skirts with threads hanging from the hem or the old sports jacket they wore at prep school? Hypothesis: The women will dress neatly, probably in new dresses or pant suits, the men in whatever is clean, unless their wives lay out their outfits for them.

And now for our family prize predictions: Captain Nemo  and I have read two shortlisted books and two longlisted books. It will be an upset if the longlisted books win! Ha!

Here is our brief discussion.

What did you like or dislike about the books, Captain Nemo?

Captain Nemo:  “I  read Paul Murray’s The Bee Sting and  Sebastian Murray’s Old God’s Time.  Two Irishmen.

“The Bee Sting is a long, good read, with a few slow spots, but overall is a very good long book.  The language is beautiful in Old God’s Time, but the story didn’t always seem believable.”

Which should win?

“Sebastian Barry’s for language, The Bee Sting for plot.”

What did you like or dislike about the books, Kat?

Me:  I read Paul Harding’s shortlisted This Other Eden and the longlisted Tan Twan Eng’s The House of Doors.

“This Other Eden is intense and gorgeously written, the story of three generations of a multi-racial community on a remote island, and the consequences when white people interfere in the early 20th century   The House of Doors is a lovely, quiet novel that alternates the story of W. H. Maugham and his friends Lesley and Robert Hamley in Penang. Lesley’s tragic stories of life in Penang influence Maugham’s short stories.”

Which should win?

“Harding’s book is perfect.  It should win hands down. But I also loved Eng’s slightly uneven novel.”

Good luck to the winner, whoever he or she may be!

Only one hour and fifteen minutes till the ceremony!