Judges for Man Booker prize announced

The judges for the prestigious and lucrative Man Booker Prize 2019 have been announced.

A “stunning” five-strong panel has been selected to assess the best of longform fiction in English, and choose the finest work for the coveted accolade and its £50,000 prize.

The director of the Hay Festival, Peter Florence, chairs the otherwise female panel, which boasts literary, musical, publishing and journalistic expertise.

Publisher Liz Calder, novelist Xiaolu Guo, former Guardian journalist Afua Hirsch, and pianist and conductor Joanna Macgregor, have been chosen to sit in judgment for next year’s prize. Anna Burns won the 2018 prize for her novel, Milkman, which enjoyed a sharp increase in sales following this year’s prize ceremony