The Booker blog and The Guardian awards

If you're at Kitabkhana because you're looking for Booker news, go away. The good folks over at 3am have started a Booker Blog, because they can. And they're doing a thorough job, which is Babu-speak for "I'm going to put my feet up, dirty socks and all, and leave the hard work to them".

The longlist for the Guardian first book award was announced while the Babu was catching up with his sock-washing.
Ground Water by Matthew Hollis (Bloodaxe)
A Chance Meeting by Rachel Cohen (Cape)
Natasha by David Bezmozgis (Cape)
The Places In Between by Rory Stewart (Picador)
Jonathan Strange and Mr Norrell by Susanna Clarke (Bloomsbury)
High Tide: News from a Warming World by Mark Lynas (Flamingo)
Becoming Strangers by Louise Dean (Scribner)
Mutants: On the Form, Varieties and Errors of Human Body by Armand Marie Leroi (HarperCollins)
The Flood by David Maine (Canongate)

And the shortlist for the Guardian children's book award is also out. I haven't read any of the books on this list, but the descriptions sound scary: you've got one about a missing mother and the problems of funny money; one about death, destruction and love between two cousins; one on the struggle of the Quakers; and one about kids trying to survive in the Germany of 1945. Tales from the Brothers Grimm, what?