The Granta list 2003

Sunday January 5, 2003
The Observer

Monica Ali, 35: her first novel about a Bangladeshi family living in UK is published his year. Unfair to call her 'the new Zadie Smith', though people will try
Nicola Barker, 36: the literary voice of Estuarine England

Rachel Cusk, 35: takes on mothers and daughters and the changing landscape of Middle England

Susan Elderkin, 34: one novel set in Arizona, the second, Voices, set in Alice Springs and coming out this year. A generous and ambitious writer

Peter Ho Davies, 36: two collections of short stories range across Britain and North America. His first novel, out this year, is set among German pows in North Wales

Philip Hensher, 37: his most recent novel, The Mulberry Empire, has a long cool look at the fantasies and failures of early Victorian imperialism

ALKennedy, 37: leading fictional anatomiser of anger, despair and - sometimes - happiness

Hari Kunzru, 33: one novel so far, The Impressionist, which had mixed reviews. Race is the subject. Several confident and comic set-pieces

Toby Litt:, 34: his most recent novel is deadkidsongs - Just William crossed with something more cruel and sinister

David Mitchell, 33: epics of modern Japan from an inventive and original writer

Andrew O'Hagan, 34: second novel, Personality, out this year. Showbusiness, Scots-Italians, Britain in the 1970s - described with the sincerity that has become O'Hagan's hallmark

David Peace, 35: a quartet of novels set in the West Riding of the Yorkshire Ripper. Powerful on police corruption and crime

Dan Rhodes, 30: First novel, Timoleon Vieta, to be published this year, which charts a dog's life in Italy. Funny, kind, but not sentimental

Ben Rice, 30: his novella, Pobby and Dingan, is set among Australia's diamond miners and relates the story of a girl's imaginary friends. Wonderful narration, perfect craftsmanship

Rachel Seiffert, 31: first novel, The Dark Room, comprises three stories about Germany, from 1920 till now. A huge subject expressed convincingly

Zadie Smith, 27: the most successful novelist on the list, and deservedly so, despite a second novel that was less generously received

Adam Thirlwell, 25: first novel, Politics, to be published this year, about a ménage à trois in North London. Funny, profound, about sex and sexual manners

Alan Warner, 38: his most recent novel is The Man Who Walks - disturbing view of decaying ruralism and the Highland life

Sarah Waters, 36: Fingersmith, a novel set in Dickensian London which doesn't rub your nose in over-researched detail. Compelling story-teller

Robert McLiam Wilson, 38: next novel - after a long gap - will be published this year. His previous, Eureka Street, evokes Belfast lives that are stranger and more various than the media allows