Since I’ve just posted my last review of books on the shortlist for the 2014 Booker Prize, it’s time for my feature, If I Gave the Award. In my opinion, many of the books on the 2014 shortlist are overrated. The winner, The Narrow Road to the Deep North by Richard Flanagan, is sidetracked by a deeply uninteresting illicit love affair, while J by Howard Jacobson is overwhelmed by its obfuscation and sly jokiness and a deeply uninteresting licit love affair. Neel Mukherjee’s The Lives of Others is more powerful than either one of those novels.
However, my preference goes to one of the other two novels. How to Be Both by Ali Smith is more inventive than the other novels in its structure and more subtle in its message. But for its ability to keep me glued to the page, I have to say that over all the others, I preferred We Are All Completely Beside Ourselves by Karen Joy Fowler.
What? Me Read? 
I must say not many of that year’s shortlist appealed to me. I only read J and The Lives of Others in the end – J was OK, but too polemical and like you I didn’t care about the characters. And I hated The Lives of Others – which is unusual because I’m normally a fan of lit-fic from/about India. Well done to you for making it through them, and I’m glad you found one that you felt deserved to win. 🙂
Ah, I disliked J much more than The Lives of Others, but both of them had lots of despicable characters!