British author Jim Crace has made the shortlist for one of the world’s most valuable literary prizes for his Man Booker-shortlisted novel Harvest, the story of a medieval village about to be subsumed by a brutal new way of life.

The Impac Dublin literary award, the world’s most lucrative for a single novel published in English, unveiled the 10-strong lineup for its €100,000 prize on Wednesday morning. Libraries around the world nominate titles for the Impac, with this year’s shortlist an eclectic mix of former prizewinners and lesser-known tales. It pits Man Booker winner Richard Flanagan’s The Narrow Road to the Deep North, set on the Thai-Burma death railway, against a debut by another Australian writer, Hannah Kent’s Burial Rites, in which a woman in 1829 Iceland awaits execution for murder.

Former winner of the Impac, the Irish writer Colum McCann, was picked for TransAtlantic, which opens with the first nonstop transatlantic flight in 1919, and Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie, whose numerous literary awards include the Orange, was shortlisted for Americanah, the story of two Nigerian teenagers who fall in love in Lagos before being pushed apart by time and distance. Libraries in Germany, Canada, Ireland, Sweden and the US all nominated Adichie’s novel, with one librarian describing it as “brimming with wit, popular culture and wry observations about race, gender and class”.

Three novels in translation also made the cut for this year’s award: Moroccan writer Mahi Binebine was chosen for Horses of God, about four friends and how they grew up to become suicide bombers, and Brazilian Bernardo Kucinski for K, in which a father searches for his daughter, “disappeared” during the military dictatorship in Brazil. Kucinski’s tale is based on the disappearance of his own sister in 1973.

The Russian author Andreï Makine, who writes in French, was selected by judges for Brief Loves That Live Forever, the Soviet Russia-set story of an orphan.

The lineup is completed with novels from two American authors: Alice McDermott, shortlisted for Someone, and Roxana Robinson, picked for Sparta, which follows the return to the US of an Iraq war veteran.

“While many of the stories reflect contemporary themes, they bring us characters facing timeless challenges of love and loss, of innocence and isolation,” said Margaret Hayes, Dublin city librarian, of the list. “These engaging stories are set against contrasting landscapes which include Brooklyn, Iceland and Lagos.”

The judging panel for this year’s award – the Impac’s 20th – features literary historian and critic Valentine Cunningham, and the writers Christine Dwyer Hickey, Daniel Hahn, Kate Pullinger and Jordi Soler. Former US court of appeals chief judge Eugene R Sullivan, now a novelist, is the non-voting chair, with the panel due to announce their choice on 17 June.

The shortlisted titles are:

1. Americanah by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie (Nigerian, Fourth Estate)

2. Horses of God by Mahi Binebine (Moroccan). Translated from French by Lulu Norman. (Tin House Books)

3. Harvest by Jim Crace (British, Picador)

4. The Narrow Road to the Deep North by Richard Flanagan (Australian, Chatto)

5. Burial Rites by Hannah Kent (Australian, Little, Brown)

6. K by Bernardo Kucinski (Brazilian). Translated from Portuguese by Sue Branford. (Latin American Bureau)

7. Brief Loves That Live Forever by Andreï Makine (French, Russian-born). Translated from French by Geoffrey Strachan. (MacLehose Press)

8. TransAtlantic by Colum McCann (Irish, Bloomsbury)

9. Someone by Alice McDermott (American, Farrar, Straus & Giroux)

10. Sparta by Roxana Robinson (American, Farrar, Straus & Giroux)