The Mookse and the Gripes discussion

If you name your 6 predictions here, I will count them, list the counts for each book, and see who has the most right once the actual shortlist is announced. Note that these are the books you expect the prize judges to choose, not necessarily the ones you would choose yourself or rank in your top six.

I have closed this thread for new comments - the discussion thread will explain why.

Final pre-shortlist counts:

Pos, Book, Count
1, Prophet Song by Paul Lynch, 26
2, Pearl by Siân Hughes, 22
3, A Spell of Good Things by Ayọ̀bámi Adébáyọ̀, 19
3, The Bee Sting by Paul Murray, 19
5, The House of Doors by Tan Twan Eng, 17
~~~~~~~~~
6, This Other Eden by Paul Harding, 14
6, In Ascension by Martin MacInnes, 14
~~~~~~~~~
8, Study for Obedience by Sarah Bernstein, 13
8, Old God's Time by Sebastian Barry, 13
10, All the Little Bird-Hearts by Viktoria Lloyd-Barlow, 9
11, Western Lane by Chetna Maroo, 7
12, If I Survive You by Jonathan Escoffery, 5
13, How to Build a Boat by Elaine Feeney, 2

Mohamed was the only person who got 5 right. The scores:
5 Mohamed
4 BookerMT2, klaudia, Kristian, Maria, Yahaira
3 _But_I_thought, Anita, Anna, Chris, Gennie, Gwendolyn, Irish75, Joe, Lascosas, Robert, Scu8a8ddy, Stephen
2 Ann, Ben, Cordelia, David, Hugh, Joy, Laura, Lili, Susan, Suzanne, Will
1 Jo

My predictions:

Prophet Song
A Spell of Good Things
The House of Doors
Pearl
How to Build a Boat
The Bee Sting

The Bee Sting
In Ascension
Prophet Song
Pearl
Old God's Time
Western Lane

The Bee Sting
Study for Obedience
In Ascension
Prophet Song
Old God's Time
Western Lane

Prophet Song
The Bee Sting
Pearl
This Other Eden
A Spell of Good Things
All the little Bird Hearts

I am rooting for Bernstein, but don't think she is going to make the shortlist. Hoping to be wrong!

A Spell of Good Things
All the Little Bird Hearts
Pearl
In Ascension
The Bee Sting
Prophet Song

Prophet Song
A Spell of Good Things
Pearl
This Other Eden
The Bee Sting
All the Little Bird Hearts

The House of Doors
Old God's Time
Prophet Song
The Bee Sting
Pearl
In Ascension

Prophet Song
This Other Eden
Pearl
The House of Doors
Study for Obedience
Bee Sting

Prophet Song
All The Little Bird-Hearts
This Other Eden
In Ascension
Pearl
The Bee Sting

This Other Eden
A Spell of Good Things
Old God’s Time
The House of Doors
If I Survive You
Pearl

In Ascension
The Bee Sting
Prophet Song
All the Little Bird-Hearts
This Other Eden
Pearl

The House of doors
Study for Obedience
All the little bird-hearts
Western Lane
Old God’s time
This other Eden

Prophet Song
The Bee Sting
A Spell of Good Things
Pearl
All the Little Bird-Hearts
The House of Doors

A Spell of Good Things
If I Survive You
Pearl
All the Little Bird-Hearts
Prophet Song
The House of Doors

My list is quite different.

Prophet Song by Paul Lynch
This Other Eden by Paul Harding
Old God's Time by Sebastian Barry
Western Lane by Chetna Maroo
The Bee Sting by Paul Murray
A Spell of Good Things by Ayọ̀bámi Adébáyọ̀

Which leaves a 50% chance that Paul will win.

A Spell of Good Things
Study for Obedience
Pearl
Western Lane
The Bee Sting
The House of Doors

A Spell of Good Things
Old God's Time
If I Survive You
Prophet Song
In Ascension
House of Doors

Winner prediction - Prophet Song, for the mother of all mothers on this year's LL.

House of Doors makes my shortlist even with the date errors, since the remaining nominees, imo, had flaws as well.

All the Little Bird-Hearts would have made my SL because I liked the writing, BUT I don't think it adequately explained why any HUMAN BEING like Dolly would turn their back on their mother without a drastic event to cause her to act like she did.

In previous years, there have been several nominees that I would have been happy winning. This year, I feel that nothing really jumped out at me as "winner." But honestly, I wasn't passionate about any of the books I read going into the Longlist announcement, so maybe not the fault of the judges. No Promise, Glory, Trust, Shuggie, which left me in awe and gave me the "this is a contender or winner" feeling after reading them prior to them making the LL.

I always just include my top 6, because I haven't a clue what the judges will do.
1. This Other Eden
2. Prophet Song
3. Study for Obedience
4. A Spell of Good Things
5. In Ascension
6. Old God's Time

I also have no clue what the judges will do. But here goes:

Prophet Song
A Spell of Good Things
The House of Doors
This Other Eden
All the Little Bird Hearts
Study for Obedience

I'm not all done with the longlist but I feel like these will be on the shortlist:

Prophet Song
The Bee Sting
Pearl
The House of Doors
Study for Obedience
This Other Eden

Prophet Song
This Other Eden
Pearl
A Spell of Good Things
Old God's Time
In Ascension

A Spell of Good Things
Prophet Song
How to Build a Boat
In Ascension
Pearl
The House of Doors

https://thebobsphere.wordpress.com/20...

Study for Obedience
In Ascension
The Bee Sting
The House of Doors
Pearl
A Spell of Good Things

Prophet Song
A Spell of Good Things
The House of Doors
Pearl
If I Survive You
The Bee Sting

I am not sure what is on the mind of the judges and we can expect anything from them. Although there were many "Des valeurs sure" on the wild , they come up with this very odd longlist. Would they choose wisely this time?

Prophet Song
Western Lane
The Bee Stings
The House of Doors
Study for obedience
This Other Eden

Bound to be at least one shock so

Western Lane
If I survive You
A Spell of Good Things
In Ascension
Prophet Song
Study for Obedience

Prophet Song
The House of Doors
This Other Eden
In Ascension
Old God's Time
Pearl

Old Gods’ Time
A Spell of Good Things
House of Doors
Prophet Song
Study for Obedience
Pearl

Prophet Song
In Ascension
The Bee Sting
Pearl
Study for Obedience
Old God's Time