Sat 03 Mar 2007Orange list peels away the drossLoose leaves:Proven heavyweights Jane Smiley,
Margaret Forster and Anne Tyler gave the longlist for the
women-only Orange Broadband Prize for Fiction a stately look when
announced this week but apparently, in order to get that longlist,
a lot of dross was waded through and rejected.Muriel Gray, chairwoman of the judging panel, painted a dreary
picture of "thinly veiled autobiographical things of no
consequence" that didn't make the grade. "They are writing small
personal takes on what it's like to be a woman," she said.