Prize season continues with the finalists for this year’s National Book Awards. The complete list below. Join us at 12:30 EST for a live chat about the finalists and other prize winners.
Fiction
Parrot and Olivier in America by Peter Carey
Born in Australia and based in New York, Peter Carey has published 10 novels, two of which won the Booker Prize: 1988’s Oscar and Lucinda and 2001’s True History of the Kelly Gang.
Plus: The Daily Beast’s Peter Stothard on Peter Carey’s Parrot and Olivier in America
Lord of Misrule by Jaimy Gordon
Jaimy Gordon’s previous novel, Bogeyman, a stylishly written coming-out story, was put on the Los Angeles Times’ list of Best Fiction of 2000, and her second novel, She Drove Without Stopping, an avant-garde coming-of-age story set in the ‘60s, was an American Library Notable Book.
Great House by Nicole Krauss
Nicole Krauss is the author of Man Walks Into a Room and The History of Love. Her work has been published in The New Yorker, Harper’s, Esquire, and The Best American Short Stories, and has been translated into more than 35 languages.
So Much for That by Lionel Shriver
Lionel Shriver’s novel The Post Birthday World was a New York Times bestseller, and We Need to Talk About Kevin won the 2005 Orange Prize. Her journalism has appeared in The Guardian, The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, and elsewhere.
I Hotel by Karen Tei Yamashita
Karen Tei Yamashita’s Through the Arc of the Rainforest received the American Book Award and the Janet Heidinger Kafka Award. She is the author of three other books.
Nonfiction
Nothing to Envy by Barbara Demick
Barbara Demick is the Los Angeles Times Beijing bureau chief and author of Logavina Street: Life and Death in a Sarajevo Neighborhood.
Cultures of War by John Dower
John Dower writes on Japan and the United States; his 1999 book about the occupation of Japan, Embracing Defeat, won the National Book Award.
Just Kids by Patti Smith
In addition to Patti Smith’s numerous albums, one of which, Horses, has been called one of the top 100 albums of all time, she has written many books, including Witt, Babel, and Woolgathering.
Secret Historian: The Life and Times of Samuel Steward by Justin Spring
Justin Spring writes monographs, catalogs, museum publications, and books about 20th-century American art and culture, including Fairfield Porter: A Life in Art.
Every Man in this Village Is a Liar: An Education in War by Megan K. Stack
Megan K. Stack was the Los Angeles Times Moscow bureau chief and has reported on war, terrorism, and political Islam from 22 countries.
Poetry
The Eternal City by Kathleen Graber
Lighthead by Terrance Hayes
By the Numbers by James Richardson
One With Others by C.D. Wright
Ignatz by Monica Youn
Young People’s Literature
Ship Breaker by Paolo Bacigalupi
Mockingbird by Kathryn Erskine
Dark Water by Laura McNeal
Lockdown by Walter Dean Myers
One Crazy Summer by Rita Williams-Garcia
Plus: Check out Book Beast, for more news on hot titles and authors and excerpts from the latest books.