…there’s plenty of good picks on the Booker Prize longlist. Nobel laureate and Remains of the Day author Kazuo Ishiguro hopes to claim his second Booker with Klara and the Sun. It’s about an ‘artificial friend’ purchased for a 14yo girl. Other big names making the list included Rachel Cusk’s Second Place and Richard Powers’ Bewilderment. Some were surprised by the omission of Normal People author Sally Rooney – her novel Beautiful World, Where Are You is set to be released in September. Judge Maya Jasanoff said the books are united by “their power to absorb the reader in an unusual story, and to do so in an artful, distinctive voice”. The shortlist will be announced on 14 September, and the winner on 3 November.