The winner of the 2011 International IMPAC Dublin Literary Award was announced last night and went to Irish author Colum McCann for his novel Let the Great World Spin.The prize for the IMPAC award is €100,000, the largest for a single novel published in English. It is also unique in that the shortlist is drawn from nominations received from public libraries around the globe, with the winner then chosen by the IMPAC judging panel. As well as being selected by the judging panel, McCann's novel also received the highest number of nominations from the participating libraries this year.
The first half of the novel is framed by a real event in New York in August 1974 when Frenchman Philip Petit performed a tightrope walk between the twin towers. The judging panel remarked of the novel
"In the opening pages of Let The Great World Spin, the people of New York City stand breathless and overwhelmed as a great artist dazzles them in a realm that seemed impossible until that moment; Colum McCann does the same thing in this novel, leaving the reader just as stunned as the New Yorkers, just as moved and just as grateful."
The book is in stock in the library so if you'd like to be stunned, moved and grateful, check it out today from our literature section here!
