[ Read an interview with Val McDermid on what it was like to judge the 2018 Man Booker Prize. ]
The novels chosen for this yr’s shortlist mirrored a preoccupation with darkish occasions and apocalyptic themes like ecological destruction, slavery and mass incarceration. Finalists included the Canadian creator Esi Edugyan’s “Washington Black,” a few boy who flees a slave plantation in Barbados and turns into an apprentice of types to his grasp’s adventurous brother; Ms. Kushner’s “