Three British writers, two Americans, and an Australian are the finalists announced today for the prestigious Booker Prize for fiction. The British nominees are Ali Smith's How to Be Both, Howard Jacobson's J, and Neel Mukherjee's The Lives of Others. The US is represented by Joshua Ferris' To Rise Again at a Decent Hour and Karen Joy Fowler's We Are All Completely Beside Ourselves. Australia's Richard Flanagan is nominated for The Narrow Road to the Deep North. This is the first year writers of all nationalities have been eligible for the Booker, previously open only to authors from Britain, Ireland, and the Commonwealth of former British colonies. The winner will be announced in London on Oct. 14. (More fiction stories.)