Preeta Samarasan's debut novel  EVENING IS THE WHOLE DAY, set in the outskirts of Ipoh in Malaysia, has been longlisted for the Orange Prize, along with Toni Morrison, Kamila Shamsie and Michelle de Kretser, among others.

EVENING IS THE WHOLE DAY tells the story of the Rajasekharan family's unravelling,  in 'a magical, exuberant tragic-comic vision of postcolonial Malaysia, reminiscent of Rushdie and Roy.' (Peter Ho Davies).  Anne Tyler picked it as one of her books of the year in the Guardian in 2008 and the novel has had an array of fine reviews, as well as being shortlisted for the Commonwealth Writers Prize, Best First Book, South East Asia and the Pacific.

The Orange shortlist will be announced on 21 April and the prize on 3 June 2009.

UK, Indian and Australian rights to EVENING IS THE WHOLE DAY were sold by Isobel Dixon to HarperCollins, on behalf of Ayesha Pande of the Collins Literary Agency in the US.

Some praise:

'As furious, controlled, cool and urgent as Aravind Adiga's THE WHITE TIGER, an introduction to a writer whose talent with narrative structure combines elegance and potency.'       Ali Smith, TLS Books of the Year, Times Literary Supplement

'A richly complex debut, weaving the troubled Malaysia of the 1980s with a dark, delicious Dickensian family drama.' Nicola Golding, Waterstones Books Quarterly

'Samarasan captures beautifully the conflict both within the family and the country during the early years of Malaysia's independence. Vibrant, descriptive, and peppered with colourful Indian-Malaysian dialogue, this is an epic that's informative without being worthy, and engrossing but not frivolous.'

Francesca Segal, The Observer

More information on Orange Prize's website here.