There is hardly a theatrical profession that has recently been so fostered, celebrated, loaded with prizes and grants as young dramatists....
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The German Book Prize is presented to the best German-language novel just before the start of the Frankfurt Book Fair as an annual award from the Börsenverein des Deutschen Buchhandels Stifung – the Foundation of the German Publishers & Booksellers Association. The Prize is intended to draw attention beyond national borders to authors writing in German, to reading and to the keynote medium of the book.
The prize was awarded on 12 October to Katrin Schmidt for her novel "You're Not Going to Die".
The 2009 shortlist: 
Rainer Merkel: "Light Years Away" (Lichtjahre Entfernt)
S. Fischer Verlag
About the book
English excerpt
Herta Müller: "Everything I Own I Carry With Me" (Atemschaukel)
Hanser Verlag
About the book
English excerpt
Norbert Scheuer: "The Rushing of the Weir" (Überm Rauschen)
C.H.Beck Verlag
About the book
English excerpt
Katrin Schmidt: You're Not Going to Die (Du Stirbst Nicht)
Kiepenheuer & Witsch Verlag
About the book
English excerpt 
Clemens J. Setz: "Frequencies" (Die Frequenzen)
Residenz Verlag
About the book
English excerpt
Stephan Thome : "Border Walk" (Grenzgang)
Suhrkamp Verlag
About the book
English excerpt
The judges for the German Book Prize 2009 are: Richard Kämmerlings, Michael Lemling, Martin Lüdke, Lothar Müller, Iris Radisch, Daniela Strigl and Hubert Winkels
RSS
Günter Grass has just published his diary from 1990, recording the tumultous events after the fall of the Berlin Wall. "From Germany to Germany" is a list of ominous predictions for the future of German unity. The former GDR writer Monika Maron looks at how blinded Grass was by his own preconceptions.
This year Turkey was the guest country at the Frankfurt Book Fair. We introduce the books that attracted the most critical attention.
and all the best for 2009!
This year's prestigious Büchner Prize went to Austrian writer Josef Winkler. He talks to Paul Jandl about dung heaps, patriarchs, the fear of speechlessness and the elegance of John Paul II's coffin. Photo © Jerry Bauer / SV
The six finalists for the German Book Prize 2008, an annual award for the best German language novel, have now been announced. Signandsight.com presents English excerpts of the shortlisted titles for the first time.
The legendary German poets, Ingeborg Bachmann and Paul Celan, met and fell in love in Vienna 1948. Their electric and torturous correspondence, which continued until 1961, has now been collected in book form for the first time. Ina Hartwig on what was probably the most complicated love story in post-war Germany.
The headlines were stolen by Charlotte Roche's moist little sex shocker and Jonathan Littell's sprawling SS fantasies but only two books united the critics: one is good and the other, utterly objectionable. There was a flurry of interest in some fabulous comics and a resurgence of the political and the historical novel. A dip into the books published in Germany this spring.
The nonfiction books this spring look into life as a budding president, a kitchen slave, a prophet, a string quartet. They pick apart the world of the elites, of lust and taste and '68.
Travels through the dreams and nightmares of Europe, in a small land of great poets, torn between Balkan catastrophe and Brussels. A reportage on Croatia, this year's partner country at the Leipzig Book Fair. By Gregor Dotzauer