Chairperson: Evelyn Conlon

What does it take to trip a man up – to send him on a crash course with his own inevitable shortcomings? Two novels by two Booker-nominated authors explore the fallout from failed ambition.

M.J. Hyland’s multi-prize-winning second novel Carry Me Down was a runaway success, with its pitch perfect dissection of family friction and clumsy adolescence. Her follow-up This Is How is a powerful and moving story of one man's determination to make a new start. Yet just as he yearns for a better life and human connection, the world conspires against him until one day he snaps...

Steve Toltz’s Booker-longlisted debut A Fraction of the Whole is a coruscating comic novel of failed connections and the absurd inevitability of disaster. From his prison cell Jasper Dean recounts the shortfalls of his father's schemes, his uncle’s treachery and how together they upset an entire continent. The result is a rollercoaster ride from obscurity to infamy and back again.

M.J. Hyland was born in London to Irish parents. Brought up in Dublin, she moved to Melbourne to study law and English. This Is How is her third novel. Steve Toltz was born in Sydney. He has lived in Montréal, Vancouver, Barcelona and Paris. A Fraction of the Whole is his first novel.