SF Awards Watch is in the process of being transferred to the new owners, so I can’t post there at the moment. I do, however, want to squee over the long list for the 2012 Impac Prize. This is one of the richest literary prizes in the world, worth a staggering €100,000 to the winner. But although the prize is judged by the usual types of suspect, the long list is put together by librarians. This year 147 nominations came from 122 cities and 45 countries worldwide. 34 are titles in translation, spanning 18 languages. And look at some of the books they have picked:

• Island Beneath the Sea, Isabel Allende (tr. Margaret Sayers Peden)
• Ship Breaker, Paolo Bacigalupi
• Zoo City, Lauren Beukes
• Mocking Jay, Suzanne Collins
• The Passage, Justin Cronin
• Under Heaven, Guy Gavriel Kay
• Under the Poppy, Kathe Koja
• The Dervish House, Ian McDonald
• Kraken, China Mieville
• Who Fears Death, Nnedi Okorafor
• Birdbrain, Johanna Sinisalo (tr. David Hackston)

There are probably other SF/F/H books on the list too, I’m by no means familiar with them all. Thank you, librarians of the world.