A Zimbabwean writer who was arrested during anti-government protests is among six finalists announced Tuesday on a diverse list of contenders for the prestigious Booker Prize for fiction. Tsitsi Dangarembga was nominated for the 50,000-pound ($64,000) award for “This Mournable Body,” which links the breakdown of its central character and turmoil in post-colonial Zimbabwe. Dangarembga, one of Zimbabwe’s most garlanded authors, was arrested in July and spent a night in detention for standing by a road in the capital of Harare and holding up a placard that said “We Want Better. Reform Our Institutions.” The Booker list this year is dominated by books from American or U.S.-based authors, including “The Shadow King” by Ethiopia-born Maaza Mengiste, Diane Cook’s dystopian tale “The New Wilderness,” Avni Doshi’s India-set “Burnt Sugar” and Brandon Taylor’s campus novel “Real Life.” Only one British writer made the cut for the U.K.´s leading book prize: Douglas Stuart for “Shuggie Bain,” the story of a boy in 1980s Glasgow. Stuart, too, is U.S.-based – he has lived in New York for years. The winner will be revealed Nov. 17, though the traditional black-tie dinner ceremony at London´s medieval Guildhall has been scrapped because of the coronavirus pandemic. Founded in 1969, the prize is open to English-language authors from around the world, but until 2014 only British, Irish and Commonwealth writers were eligible. That year´s change sparked fears among some Britons that it would become a U.S-dominated prize. That hasn´t happened, yet. There have been two American winners, Paul Beatty´s “The Sellout” in 2016 and George Saunders´ “Lincoln in the Bardo” in 2017. The prize’s literary director, Gaby Wood, said she was not concerned by the lack of British novelists on the shortlist. She said readers “don´t look at passports.” The prize, subject to intense speculation and a flurry of betting, usually brings the victor a huge boost in sales and profile. This year’s shortlist includes four debut novelists – Doshi, Cook, Stuart and Taylor – and omits high-profile books including Anne Tyler´s “Redhead by the Side of the Road” and “The Mirror and the Light,” the conclusion of Hilary Mantel´s acclaimed Tudor trilogy. Mantel won the Booker for both its predecessors, “Wolf Hall” and “Bring up the Bodies” and had been widely tipped for a third victory. Thriller writer Lee Child, one of the judges, said Mantel´s book was “an absolutely wonderful novel.” “But as good as it was, there were some books that were better,” he said.