Lady Macbeth seeks explanation for new world crimes, and Dr D has an answer

Canadian author Margaret Atwood has joined the Booker Prize race for the second time. In 2000, Atwood bagged the award for 'Blind Assassins'. This year, 'The Testaments', a sequel to 'The Handmaid's Tale', has been nominated for the prize. The predecessor has now been adapted by a television series of the same name which is in its third season now.

The book comes 15 years after its predecessor, and follows the lives of three women in Gilead. It offers readers an answer to all the questions that remained untouched in the first edition. The book will hit the shelves on September 10.

The 79-year-old author, literary critic and environmentalist, has 80 published works in her name including poetry books, short non-fiction novels, children's books and a graphic novel.

Besides the Booker's Prize, Atwood is also the recipient of Governor General's Award, Franz Kafka Prize, and PEN Center USA Lifetime Achievement Award. Despite being an established author, Atwood calls herself a terrible speller.

Irish author Kevin Barry joined the Booker Prize longlist with his novel 'Night Boat to Tangier'. The book chronicles the story of two Irish gangsters (Charlie and Maurice), waiting on a Tangier for a boat, discussing their past life and love, while looking for the former’s missing daughter.

The 50-year-old, also a winner of the International IMPAC Dublin Literary Award, is the only Irish author to join this year's longlist.

Last year, the Booker Prize was taken home by another Irish author, Anna Burns, for 'Milkman'.

British-Indian novelist Salman Rushdie's yet-to-be-published novel, 'Quichotte', is a part of the 13 literary wonders on this year's longlist. The book is expected to release on September 3.

Rushdie took home the prestigious prize for 'Midnight's Children', in 1981. It was the 72-year-old's second book and was deemed as the 'the best novel of all winners' on the 25th and 40th anniversary of the Booker Prize.

In 1983, Rushdie was appointed as a fellow of the Royal Society of Literature. Queen Elizabeth II, in 2007, knighted him for his contribution to Literature. Rushdie was ranked number 13 by The Times in 2008 among the 50 greatest British writers since 1945.

Oyinkan Braithwaite's novel chronicles the life of a Nigerian girl, forced to cover her sister's crimes when the little one develops love for killing her boyfriends. The book includes dark humour, a love story and family drama, and how abusive behaviour is passed onto future generations in a family.

31-year-old Braithwaite spent her childhood partly in Nigeria and then in UK. Earlier in 2016, she was nominated for the Commonwealth Short Story prize. This year, she bagged the LA Times Award for Best Crime Thriller.

Lucy Ellmann is the only American author (though she has joint British citizenship) to feature in this year’s longlist.

Narrated by an Ohio homemaker, 'Ducks, Newburyport' tries to bridge the gap between reality and the US as created by current President Donald Trump.

The narrator talks about past and present America, and how it’s sleepwalking towards an environmental disaster. The monologue runs sans paragraphs and full stops. The 426,100-word book is narrated from the perspective of a mountain lion.

A recipient of multiple literary honours, the 62-year-old Anglo-American novelist’s first book, 'Sweet Desserts' - published in 1988 - won her the Guardian Fiction Prize. Ellmann has also been honoured with the Royal Literary Fund.

Bernardine Evaristo's 'Girl, Woman, Other' is a book about love, joy, imagination, but mostly a tale of collective struggles of black women. It chronicles the lives of 12 characters either living in different decades or overlapping, dealing with their share of struggle. The author tries to define how connections can be made between different people, from different walks of life.

60-year-old Evaristo is the author of eight fiction and verse-fiction books. Two of her creations have been converted into BBC Radio 4 dramas. She is also the current Vice-Chair of the Royal Society of Literature. The London-born is the founder of Brunel International African Poetry Prize.

In 2014, her novel 'Mr Loverman' bagged the Publishing Triangle Ferro-Grumley Award for LGBT Fiction (USA) and the Jerwood Fiction Uncovered Prize. Her verse novel 'Lara' was the recipient of EMMA Best Novel Award in 1998.

John Lanchester’s book is set in the future, that is not that far from the present. It speaks of a time when due to a climatic event named 'The Change', movement between countries is outlawed. A young person is then assigned to the wall, guarding the British coastline, looking for people named 'Others' who are likely to show up. The story shows how 'Others' from the strange world may soon take over with their cruelty and how it may affect humans.

The 57-year-old father-of-two, besides being a Booker nominee, is also the recipient of Whitbread Book Award for his 1996 book 'The Debt to Pleasure'. The same novel helped him win the 1997 Hawthornden Prize. His 2012 book 'Capital' was converted to a three-part TV serial by BBC 1.

Deborah Levy's yet-to-be-published book includes two versions of the same story interwoven together. In 1989, the protagonist is hit by a car at Abbey Road crossing, then goes to see his girlfriend and travels to East Germany to bury his father. In 2016, he is again hit by a car on the same spot. However, this time, he spends the following days in a hospital, in and out of consciousness while his father sits beside him. The book is due to be released next week.

The 56-year-old’s two other books have also made it to the Booker longlist, 'Swimming Home' in 2012 and 'Hot Milk' in 2016.

Valeria Luiselli took inspiration from the American policy that separates children from parents at the US-Mexico border for her book. It covers the life of a young family from New York that sets out on a road trip to the southern border. And as they venture on their leisure holiday, several Mexican children begin their journey of trying to cross the US border.

The 35-year-old Mexican author’s novel 'Faces in the Crowd' was the recipient of the Los Angeles Times Art Seidenbaum Award for First Fiction.

In 2015, Luiselli's 'The Story of My Teeth' turned finalist for the National Book Critics Circle Award, and in 2018, she won the American Book Award for 'Tell Me How It Ends: An Essay in 40 Questions'.