Goblinproofing One's Chicken Coop and How Tea Cosies
Changed the World are among the books vying for the Oddest Book Title award.
Last year's
Diagram Prize was won by Saiyuud Dwong's cookbook Cooking With Poo.
Other titles up
this year include Was Hitler Ill? and How to Sharpen Pencils.
The Bookseller
diarist Horace Bent is at the helm and said he is glad "to represent a
prize that draws attention to authors not called Hilary Mantel".
Mantel is the
first woman to have won the prestigious Man Booker Prize twice.
The Diagram
Prize is now in its 35th year of championing books with quirky names.
This year Lofts
of North America: Pigeon Lofts by Jerry Gagne has been featured, as has In
God's Doodle: The Life and Times of the Penis by Tom Hickman, which explores
man's relationship with his "most precious ornament".
Philip Stone,
the Diagram Prize co-ordinator, said he hoped to see the shortlisted books in
shops around the UK alongside best-sellers like E L James' Fifty Shades
trilogy.
"Upon my
next trip to my local independent bookshop, I hope to see it alongside all the
pornographic literature that appears to be keeping the entire book industry in
rude health," he said.
He added:
"People might think this prize is just a bit of fun, but I think it draws
welcome attention to an undervalued art."
Previous
winners include Greek Rural Postmen and Their Cancellation Numbers, How to
Avoid Huge Ships and Living with Crazy Buttocks.
The winner, who
receives a bottle of claret will be announced on 22 March.
FULL SHORTLIST
Was Hitler Ill? by Hans-Joachim
Neumann and Henrik Eberle
Lofts of North
America: Pigeon Lofts by Jerry Gagne
God's Doodle: The Life
and Times of the Penis by Tom Hickman
Goblinproofing One's
Chicken Coop by Reginald Bakeley
How Tea Cosies Changed
the World by Loani Prior
How to Sharpen Pencils
by David Rees
Source: BBC
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