BBC Samuel Johnson Prize 2010 Longlist

The BBC Samuel Johnson Longlist was announced today. Chair of the judging panel, Evan Davis, said: “This is an unusual and eclectic long list of terrific books. It is particularly gratifying that our selection demonstrates the worldliness of good non-fiction writing, with books that take us from China and India, to Africa and the Arctic.”

To see what the critics had to say about the nineteen books up for the £20,000 prize, click on the titles below:

The Music Instinct by Philip Ball (Bodley Head)

Alex’s Adventures in Numberland by Alex Bellos (Bloomsbury)

Whole Earth Discipline by Stewart Brand (Atlantic)

Making Haste from Babylon by Nick Bunker (Bodley Head)

Nine Lives: In Search of the Sacred in Modern India by William Dalrymple (Bloomsbury)

Nothing to Envy: Real Lives in North Korea by Barbara Demick (Granta)

Country Driving by Peter Hessler (Canongate)

The Secret Lives of Buildings by Edward Hollis (Portobello)

Blood Knots by Luke Jennings (Atlantic)

Family Britain 1951 – 1957 by David Kynaston (Bloomsbury)

On Roads by Joe Moran (Profile)

When Skateboards will be Free by Said Sayrafiezadeh (Hamish Hamilton)

Too Big to Fail: Inside the Battle to Save Wall Street by Andrew Ross Sorkin (Allen Lane)

Burying the Bones: Pearl Buck in China by Hilary Spurling (Profile)

The Woman Who Shot Mussolini by Frances Stonor Saunders (Faber)

A Gambling Man: Charles II and the Restoration by Jenny Uglow (Faber)

Dreams in a Time of War by Ngugi Wa Thiong’o (Harvill Secker)

The Magnetic North by Sara Wheeler (Jonathan Cape)

Catching Fire: How Cooking made us Human by Richard Wrangham (Profile)

Evan Davis is joined on the judging panel by novelist and journalist for the Financial Times, Jan Dalley; executive editor of The Times, Daniel Finkelstein; editor of New Scientist, Roger Highfield; and author and best-selling historian Stella Tillyard.

The shortlist will be announced in late May and the winner will be revealed in July.

Last year’s winner was Leviathan or The Whale by Philip Hoare. To read the all reviews for the 2009 longlist click here