Bookmakers predict two way shoot-out for ‘year of grim’ Man Booker Prize

Bookmakers are predicting a two-way shoot-out between acclaimed Hawaiian novelist Hanya Yanagihara’s “A Little Life” and Derby’s Sunjeev Sahota’s “The Year of the Runaways” to win today’s 2015 Man Booker Prize.

Yanagihara’s “A Little Life” at present leads the market at 5/6, and has been the leading contender since the July longlist announcement. The Hawaiian novelist whose book has been described by critics as a “harrowing miserabilist epic” is the public favourite having gained huge following in the US and UK.

Playing David to Yanagihara’s Goliath, is second time author Sunjeev Sahota, whose book “The Year of the Runaways” tells the story of four Asian migrants struggling to make a living in the UK.

Sahota a surprise candidate when the longlist was first announced, has climbed to second favourite at 4/1.

Heading into the final hours before the official announcement by the Man Booker panel, Yanagihara and Sahota appear to be the main contenders for the £50,000 English language literature prize.

Jamaican novelist Marlon James ‘A Brief History of Seven Killings’ which depicts interconnected violent story-lines between Kingston and New York, is currently viewed as the ‘best-placed outsider’ at 7/1. A James victory would represent the first Man Booker Prize for a Caribbean author.

This year’s Man Booker prize which rewards fiction based literature in the English language has been described as the ‘year of grim’, due to the violent and gloomy subject matter depicted by competing  authors