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Ex-thesis in line for top prize
A novel which began life as a student's thesis has been longlisted for this year's Orange Prize for Fiction.
Eleanor Catton, 24, began writing The Rehearsal, about teenage life, when she was barely out of her teens herself.
She has now been pitted against literary heavyweights such as Booker Prize winner Hilary Mantel – longlisted for Wolf Hall – and Small Island author Andrea Levy, for her fifth novel The Long Song.
Ms Catton is one of seven debut novelists to appear on the 20-strong longlist of the 30,000 international prize, now in its 15th year, for female authors.
Of the 20 authors on this year's longlist 13 are British, a number which matches the previous record in 2005.
She was born in Canada but moved to New Zealand at the age of six and studied creative writing at Victoria University in Wellington.
The Rehearsal, published three years after she submitted it at the age of 20 as her Masters at Victoria University, is about the aftermath of a sex scandal at a girls' school.
Other authors include Rosie Alison, who co-produced the movie The Boy in the Striped Pyjamas, and is longlisted for her first novel The Very Thought of You, and Tipping the Velvet author Sarah Waters, listed for her fifth novel, The Little Stranger.
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Saturday 26 May 2012
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