# 2005 in literature

This article contains information about the literary events and publications of 2005.

## Events

* February 25 – Canada Reads selects Rockbound by Frank Parker Day as the novel to be read across the nation.
* March 26 – The classic U.K. science fiction series Doctor Who returns to television with a script by Russell T Davies, the executive producer.
* April 23 – The Grande Bibliothèque at the Bibliothèque et Archives nationales du Québec is officially opened. It actually opens on April 30.
* June 13 – The poet Dannie Abse is injured and his wife Joan killed in an accident on the M4 in South Wales.
* August 15 – An integrated National Library of Norway opens to readers in Oslo for the first time.

## New books
### Fiction

* Tariq Ali – A Sultan in Palermo
* Rajaa Alsanea – Girls of Riyadh (بنات الرياض, Banat al-Riyadh)
* Avi – Never Mind
* Tash Aw – The Harmony Silk Factory
* Steve Aylett – Lint
* Doreen Baingana – Tropical Fish (short stories)
* John Banville – The Sea
* Sebastian Barry – A Long Long Way
* Nelson Bond – Other Worlds Than Ours
* Dionne Brand – What We All Long For
* Orson Scott Card
** Magic Street
** Shadow of the Giant
* Rita Chowdhury – Deo Langkhui
* Wendy Coakley-Thompson – What You Won't Do for Love
* Eoin Colfer – Artemis Fowl and the Opal Deception
* Bernard Cornwell – The Pale Horseman
* Colin Cotterill – Thirty-Three Teeth
* Robert Crais – The Forgotten Man
* Mitch Cullin – A Slight Trick of the Mind
* Michael Cunningham – Specimen Days
* Rana Dasgupta – Tokyo Cancelled
* Lindsey Davis – See Delphi and Die
* Abha Dawesar – Babyji
* L. Sprague de Camp – Years in the Making: the Time-Travel Stories of L. Sprague de Camp
* Troy Denning
** The Joiner King
** The Swarm War
** The Unseen Queen
* Bret Easton Ellis – Lunar Park
* Alicia Erian – Towelhead
* Steve Erickson – Our Ecstatic Days
* Sebastian Faulks – Human Traces
* Amanda Filipacchi – Love Creeps
* Jonathan Safran Foer – Extremely Loud & Incredibly Close
* Nicci French – Catch Me When I Fall
* Gayleen Froese – Touch
* Cornelia Funke – Inkspell
* David Gibbins – Atlantis
* Kate Grenville – The Secret River (Melbourne)
* Abdulrazak Gurnah – Desertion
* Margaret Peterson Haddix – Among the Enemy
* Joanne Harris – Gentlemen & Players
* Carl Hiaasen – Flush
* Charlie Higson – SilverFin
* Peter Hobbs – The Short Day Dying
* John Irving – Until I Find You
* Kazuo Ishiguro – Never Let Me Go
* Uzodinma Iweala – Beasts of No Nation
* Raymond Khoury – The Last Templar
* Stephen King – The Colorado Kid
* Dean Koontz – Velocity
* Elizabeth Kostova – The Historian
* Stieg Larsson – The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo
* Marina Lewycka – A Short History of Tractors in Ukrainian
* Yiyun Li – A Thousand Years of Good Prayers (short stories)
* James Luceno
** Dark Lord: The Rise of Darth Vader
** Labyrinth of Evil
* Mike McCormack – Notes from a Coma
* Ian McEwan – Saturday
* Elizabeth McKenzie – Stop That Girl
* Kevin MacNeil – The Stornoway Way
* Gregory Maguire – Son of a Witch
* Gabriel García Márquez – Memories of My Melancholy Whores
* Stephenie Meyer – Twilight
* David Michaels – Tom Clancy's Splinter Cell: Operation Barracuda
* Robert Muchamore
** Maximum Security
** The Killing
* Péter Nádas – Parallel Stories
* Garth Nix – Drowned Wednesday
* Chuck Palahniuk – Haunted
* Christopher Paolini – Eldest
* Robert B. Parker – School Days
* Ruth Rendell – End in Tears
* Salman Rushdie – Shalimar the Clown
* Darren Shan – Lord Loss (first of The Demonata series)
* Zadie Smith – On Beauty
* Wesley Stace – Misfortune
* Olen Steinhauer – 36 Yalta Boulevard
* Matthew Stover – Star Wars Episode III: Revenge of the Sith
* Thomas Sullivan – Second Soul
* Jean-François Susbielle – La Morsure du dragon
* Vikas Swarup – Q & A
* Rupert Thomson – Divided Kingdom
* Harry Turtledove (editor) – The Enchanter Completed: A Tribute Anthology for L. Sprague de Camp
* Andrew Vachss – Two Trains Running
* Catherynne M. Valente – Yume No Hon: The Book of Dreams
* Michal Viewegh – Lekce tvůrčího psaní
* Narayan Wagle – Palpasa Cafe (पल्पसा क्याफे)
* Nalini Warriar – The Enemy Within
* David Weber – At All Costs
* Samantha Weinberg – The Moneypenny Diaries: Guardian Angel
* Kirby Wright – Punahou Blues
* Markus Zusak – The Book Thief

### Children and young people

* David Almond – Clay
* Charlie Jane Anders – Choir Boy
* Jackie French – They Came on Viking Ships
* Jonathon Scott Fuqua – King of the Pygmies
* John Green – Looking for Alaska
* Charlie Higson – SilverFin
* Julius Lester – The Old African
* Claire and Monte Montgomery - Hubert Invents the Wheel
* Jenny Nimmo – Charlie Bone and the Castle of Mirrors
* Jane O'Connor – Fancy Nancy (first in a series of over 70 books)
* Margie Palatini (with Barry Moser) – The Three Silly Billies
* Peter Parnell and Justin Richardson – And Tango Makes Three
* Philip Reeve – Infernal Devices
* Rick Riordan – The Lightning Thief
* J. K. Rowling – Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince
* Lemony Snicket – The Penultimate Peril
* Dugald Steer (with Nghiem Ta, etc.) – Wizardology: The Book of the Secrets of Merlin
* Jonathan Stroud – Ptolemy's Gate
* Scott Westerfeld – Uglies (first in the Uglies series of four books)
* Markus Zusak – The Book Thief

### Drama

* Catherine Filloux – Lemkin's House
* debbie tucker green
** stoning mary
** generations
* Oleg Kagan – The Black Hat
* Carlos Lacamara – Nowhere on the Border
* Peter Morris – Guardians
* Vern Thiessen – Shakespeare's Will
* Laura Wade
** Colder Than Here
** Breathing Corpses
* Vincent Woods – A Cry from Heaven

### Poetry

* Carol Ann Duffy – Rapture

### Non-fiction

* Matthew Bortolin – The Dharma of Star Wars
* Edwin Bryant – Indo-Aryan Controversy: Evidence and inference in Indian history
* Francis Chalifour – After
* Jung Chang & Jon Halliday – Mao: The Unknown Story
* Theodore Dalrymple – Our Culture, What's Left of It: The Mandarins and the Masses
* Michel Déon – Horseman, Pass By! (Cavalier, passe ton chemin!)
* Jared Diamond – Collapse: How Societies Choose to Fail or Succeed
* Joan Didion – The Year of Magical Thinking
* Robert Fisk – The Great War for Civilisation: The Conquest of the Middle East
* Randy Grim – Miracle Dog
* John Grogan – Marley & Me
* Michael Gross – 740 Park: The Story of the World's Richest Apartment Building
* James Whitney Hicks - 50 Signs of Mental Illness: A Guide to Understanding Mental Health
* Adam Hochschild – Bury the Chains
* Tom Holland – Persian Fire: The First World Empire and the Battle for the West
* Tony Judt – Postwar: A History of Europe Since 1945
* W. Chan Kim and Renée Mauborgne – Blue Ocean Strategy
* Lawrence M. Krauss – Hiding in the Mirror
* Mark Levin – Men In Black: How The Supreme Court Is Destroying America
* Alexander Masters – Stuart: A Life Backwards
* Azadeh Moaveni – Lipstick Jihad
* Peter C. Newman – The Secret Mulroney Tapes: Unguarded Confessions of a Prime Minister
* Lisa Randall – Warped Passages
* Paul A. Robinson – Queer Wars
* Michael Ruhlman and Brian Polcyn – Charcuterie: The Craft of Salting, Smoking and Curing
* James S. Shapiro – 1599: A Year in the Life of William Shakespeare
* Masamune Shirow – Ghost in the Shell 2: Man/Machine Interface
* Rebecca Solnit – A Field Guide to Getting Lost
* David Southwell – Secrets and Lies
* James B. Stewart – DisneyWar

## Films

* Charlie and the Chocolate Factory
* Oliver Twist
* Pride & Prejudice
* Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire

## Deaths

* January 4 – Humphrey Carpenter, English biographer, children's fiction writer and radio broadcaster (born 1946)
* January 7 – Pierre Daninos, French novelist (born 1913)
* January 14 – Charlotte MacLeod, American mystery writer (born 1922)
* January 15
** Walter Ernsting, German science fiction author (born 1920)
** Elizabeth Janeway, American feminist author (born 1913)
* January 19 – K. Sello Duiker, South African novelist (suicide; born 1974)
* January 20 – Roland Frye, American theologian and critic (born 1921)
* January 21
** John L. Hess, American journalist and critic (born 1917)
** Theun de Vries, Dutch writer and poet (born 1907)
* January 24 – Vladimir Savchenko, Ukrainian science fiction writer (born 1933)
* January 25 – Max Velthuijs, Dutch writer and illustrator (born 1923)
* January 29 – Ephraim Kishon, Israeli satirist, dramatist, and screenwriter (born 1924)
* February 10 – Arthur Miller, American playwright (born 1915)
* February 11 – Jack L. Chalker, American science fiction writer (born 1944)
* February 20 – Hunter S. Thompson, American writer, creator of Gonzo journalism (born 1937)
* February 21 – Guillermo Cabrera Infante, Cuban novelist (born 1929)
* February 25 – Phoebe Hesketh, English poet (born 1909)
* March 7 – Willis Hall, English playwright (born 1929)
* March 8
** Alice Thomas Ellis, English novelist, essayist and cookery book author (born 1932)
** Anna Haycraft, English novelist (born 1932)
* March 10 – Patience Gray, English cookery and travel writer (born 1917)
* March 17 – Andre Norton, American science fiction writer (born 1912)
* March 22 – Anthony Creighton, English playwright (born 1922)
* March 30 – Robert Creeley, American poet (born 1926)
* April 5 – Saul Bellow, Canadian writer (born 1915)
* April 7 – Yvonne Vera, Zimbabwean novelist (meningitis, born 1964)
* April 26 – Augusto Roa Bastos, Paraguayan novelist (born 1917)
* May 7 – Tristan Egolf, American novelist (suicide, born 1971)
* June 9 – Hovis Presley, English poet (heart attack, born 1960)
* June 10 – Nick Darke, Cornish playwright (cancer, born 1948)
* June 14 – Norman Levine, Canadian short story writer (born 1923)
* June 16 – Enrique Laguerre, Puerto Rican novelist (born 1905)
* June 20 – Larry Collins, American novelist (born 1929)
* June 22 – William Donaldson, English satirist (born 1935)
* June 27 – Shelby Foote, American novelist (born 1916)
* June 28 – Philip Hobsbaum, Scottish poet and critic (born 1932)
* June 30 – Christopher Fry, English dramatist (born 1907)
* July 6
** Evan Hunter, American novelist (born 1926)
** Claude Simon, French Nobel laureate in literature (born 1913)
* July 7 – Gustaf Sobin, American poet (born 1935)
* July 17 – Gavin Lambert, English novelist and biographer (born 1924)
* July 19 – Edward Bunker, American crime writer (born 1933)
* August 9 – Judith Rossner, American novelist (born 1935)
* August 16 – William Corlett, English author and playwright (born 1938)
* August 21 – Dahlia Ravikovitch, Israeli poet (born 1036)
* August 29 – Sybil Marshall, English novelist (born 1913)
* September 3 – R. S. R. Fitter, English nature writer (born 1913)
* September 26 – Helen Cresswell, English children's writer (born 1934)
* September 27
** Ronald Pearsall, English writer (born 1927)
** Mary Lee Settle, American novelist (born 1918)
* October 2 – August Wilson, American playwright (born 1945)
* October 17 – Ba Jin (巴金), Chinese novelist (born 1904)
* October 31 – Amrita Pritam, Indian Punjabi poet and novelist (born 1919)
* November 1 – Michael Thwaites, Australian poet (born 1915)
* November 2 – Gordon A. Craig, Scottish historian
* November 4 – Michael G. Coney, Canadian science-fiction writer (born 1932)
* November 5 – John Fowles, English writer (born 1926)
* November 21 – Aileen Fox, English archaeologist (born 1907)
* November 26 – Stan Berenstain, American children's writer and illustrator (born 1923)
* December 1 – Mary Hayley Bell, dramatist
* December 2 – Christine Pullein-Thompson, English novelist (born 1925)
* December 9 – Robert Sheckley, American short story writer (born 1928)
* December 15 – Julián Marías, Spanish philosopher and author (born 1914)
* December 16 – Kenneth Bulmer, English novelist and short story writer (born 1921)

## Awards

* Nobel Prize in Literature: Harold Pinter
* Camões Prize: Lygia Fagundes Telles

### Australia

* The Australian/Vogel Literary Award: Andrew T. O'Connor, Tuvalu
* C. J. Dennis Prize for Poetry: M. T. C. Cronin, <More or Less Than> 1–100
* Kenneth Slessor Prize for Poetry: Samuel Wagan Watson, Smoke Encrypted Whispers
* Miles Franklin Award: Andrew McGahan, The White Earth

### Canada

* Governor General's Award for English-language fiction: David Gilmour, A Perfect Night to Go to China
* Griffin Poetry Prize: Roo Borson, Short Journey Upriver Towards Oishida and Charles Simic, Selected Poems: 1963-2003
* Hugo Award for Best Novel: Susanna Clarke, Jonathan Strange & Mr Norrell
* Scotiabank Giller Prize: David Bergen, The Time in Between
* Edna Staebler Award for Creative Non-Fiction: Anne Coleman, I'll Tell You a Secret

### Sweden

* Astrid Lindgren Memorial Award: Philip Pullman and Ryōji Arai

### United Kingdom

* Bruntwood Prize for Playwriting (first award): Duncan Macmillan, Monster
* Caine Prize for African Writing: S. A. Afolabi, "Monday Morning"
* Carnegie Medal for children's literature: Mal Peet, Tamar
* Cholmondeley Award: Jane Duran, Christopher Logue, M. R. Peacocke, Neil Rollinson
* Commonwealth Writers Prize: Andrea Levy, Small Island
* Dagger of Daggers: John le Carré, The Spy Who Came in from the Cold (1963)
* Eric Gregory Award: Melanie Challenger, Carolyn Jess, Luke Kennard, Jaim Smith
* James Tait Black Memorial Prize for biography: Sue Prideaux, Edvard Munch: Behind the Scream
* James Tait Black Memorial Prize for fiction: Ian McEwan, Saturday
* Man Booker International Prize (first award): Ismail Kadare
* Man Booker Prize: John Banville, The Sea
* Samuel Johnson Prize: Jonathan Coe, Like A Fiery Elephant: The Story of B. S. Johnson
* Orange Prize for Fiction: Lionel Shriver, We Need to Talk About Kevin
* Somerset Maugham Award: Justin Hill, Passing Under Heaven; Maggie O'Farrell, The Distance Between Us
* Whitbread Book of the Year Award: Hilary Spurling, Matisse the Master: The Conquest of Colour 1909-1954

### United States

* Aiken Taylor Award for Modern American Poetry: B. H. Fairchild
* Agnes Lynch Starrett Poetry Prize: Rick Hilles, Brother Salvage: Poems
* Arthur Rense Prize: Daniel Hoffman
* Bollingen Prize for Poetry: Jay Wright
* Brittingham Prize in Poetry: Susanna Childress, Jagged with Love
* Compton Crook Award: Tamara Siler Jones, Ghosts in the Snow
* Frost Medal: Marie Ponsot
* Hugo Award: Susanna Clarke, Jonathan Strange & Mr Norrell
* Lambda Literary Awards: Multiple categories; see 2005 Lambda Literary Awards.
* National Book Award for Poetry: W. S. Merwin, Migration: New and Selected Poems
* National Book Critics Circle Award: to War Trash by Ha Jin
* Newbery Medal: Cynthia Kadohata, Kira-Kira
* PEN/Faulkner Award for Fiction: to The March by E.L. Doctorow
* Pulitzer Prize for Drama: John Patrick Shanley, Doubt: A Parable
* Pulitzer Prize for Fiction: Marilynne Robinson, Gilead
* Pulitzer Prize for Poetry: Ted Kooser, Delights & Shadows
* Wallace Stevens Award: Gerald Stern
* Whiting Awards:
    Fiction: Sarah Shun-lien Bynum, Nell Freudenberger, Seth Kantner, John Keene (fiction/poetry)
    Plays: Rinne Groff
    Poetry: Thomas Sayers Ellis, Ilya Kaminsky, Dana Levin, Spencer Reece, Tracy K. Smith

### Other

* International Dublin Literary Award: Edward P. Jones, The Known World
* German Book Prize (first award): Arno Geiger, Es geht uns gut (We Are Doing Fine)
* Commander of the Ordre des Arts et des Lettres: Patti Smith