‘Fast Food Nation’ author Eric Schlosser on short list for Lionel Gelber Prize

TORONTO – “Fast Food Nation” author Eric Schlosser is among the finalists for this year’s Canadian-founded Lionel Gelber Prize for books on foreign affairs.

The American investigative journalist made the short list for “Command and Control: Nuclear Weapons, the Damascus Accident, and the Illusion of Safety” (The Penguin Press).

Founded in 1989 by Canadian diplomat Lionel Gelber, the $15,000 prize honours a “non-fiction book in English on foreign affairs that seeks to deepen public debate on significant international issues.”

Others who made the short list include New York-based international economics expert Benn Steil for “The Battle of Bretton Woods: John Maynard Keynes, Harry Dexter White, and the Making of a New World Order” (Princeton University Press).

Irish historian Brendan Simms is a finalist for “Europe: The Struggle for Supremacy, from 1453 to the Present” (Basic Books).

The short list is rounded out by Americans Lynne Olson for “Those Angry Days: Roosevelt, Lindbergh, and America’s Fight Over World War II, 1939-1941” (Random House) and Gary J. Bass for “The Blood Telegram: Nixon, Kissinger, and a Forgotten Genocide” (Alfred A. Knopf).

The winner will be announced on March 31.

Canadian journalist William Thorsell was chair of this year’s international jury, which also included Timothy Garton Ash, Daniel W. Drezner, Chrystia Freeland and Matias Spektor.