Among those found on other selections, we note the presence of Gaspard Koenig (on Goncourt and Renaudot), Jean-Baptiste Andrea, already crowned with the Fnac novel prize who is also a contender for the competition. Jessica L. Nelson, whose novel on Louise Collet, although published in April, appears on the Renaudot and Interallié lists.

A question comes up every year: will the jury award its award to a journalist-writer as is the DNA of the prize created in December 1930 by around thirty journalists who lunched at the Cercle de l’Union interalliée in Paris while waiting the deliberations of the ladies of the Femina Prize jury. Last year’s winner was Philibert Humm, with Roman Fleuve (Equateurs).

The full list:

Jean-Baptiste Andrea, Watch over her (The Iconoclast)

Claire Conruyt, For Who Walks Into the Night (L’Observatoire)

Régis Franc, I’m fine (Les Presses de la Cité)

Gaspard Koenig, Humus (The Observatory)

David Le Bailly,Hotel de la Folie (Seuil)

Jessica L. Nelson, The Stormy One (Albin Michel)

Louis-Henri de la Rochefoucauld, The Little Pranksters (Robert-Laffont)

Charles Roquin, The Masters of Bayreuth (Le Cherche-Midi)

Bertrand de Saint Vincent, A certain casualness (Le Rocher)

The jury is made up of Stéphane Denis, Jacques Duquesne, Serge Lentz, Gilles Martin-Chauffier, Éric Neuhoff, Christophe Ono-dit-Biot, Jean-René Van der Plaetsen, Jean-Marie Rouart, Jean-Christophe Rufin and Florian Zeller. And Philibert Humm for this edition. And In June 2023, following the death of Philippe Tesson, the writer and academician Jean-Marie Rouart became president of the jury.

The second list will be announced on October 31 and the final list will be released on November 9. The prize announcement will take place on November 22, at the Lasserre restaurant in Paris.

The 2023 winner will join a prestigious list which started with André Malraux, La Voix royale. They followed, among others, Roger Vailland, Paul Guimard, Jean Dutourd, Antoine Blondin, Félicien Marceau, Michel Déon, and more recently Philippe Djian and Michel Houellebecq, to ​​name just a few.