As voting enters its final weeks to determine the winners of the next Prometheus awards, it’s worth highlighting how several of this year’s Best Novel finalists have been gaining recognition and sparking discussions in the broader culture.
That includes Lionel Shriver’s Mania, Danny King’s Cancelled, Wil McCarthy’s Beggar’s Sky, C.J. Cherryh and Jane S. Fancher’s Alliance Unbound, Michael Flynn’s In the Belly of the Whale, based on interviews, podcasts and publications we’ve come across. (If you become aware of columns, podcasts, interviews or other media coverage of any of our Best Novel finalists, or for that matter, our Hall of Fame finalists, please let us know as soon as possible!)
Mania, in particular, has sparked both timely commentary and podcasts, including an interesting interview with Shriver and a Substack column drawing parallels between Mania and today’s cultural-political trends.
Dutch-American writer and courageous dissident Ayaan Hirsi Ali invited Shriver, an international best-selling author, to join her on a podcast for a lengthy interview – with some relevant excerpts quoted below.
Meanwhile, on Holly’s Substack column, Holly “Mathnerd” has written a column titled “The Sound of One Window Shifting” about “the moment a satirical novel I read and enjoyed last year stopped feeling like fiction.”
That novel, of course, is Shriver’s Mania – whose satirical and cautionary themes are highlighted in the Prometheus blog review.
