Using Awards Lists as a RA Tool: National Book Foundation Long Lists

All last week and this morning the National Book Foundation released their long lists. Here are the direct links to each list:

• Fiction
• Nonfiction
• Poetry
• Translated Literature
• Young People's Literature
• 5 Under 35

This post is your semi-regular reminder that awards lists make the best RA Tool for a variety of reasons. And the National Book Foundation long list announcement is one of the better examples because it covers a wide swath of literature, categories and age ranges. 

Plus, the 5 Under 35 is a must use list of authors for every library. Specifically, last year I posted about the 5 Under 35 lists [current and backlist] as an excellent resource for trends and reading suggestions here. It's worth a look today, especially because the 5 Under 35 was released just this morning.

And of course here is the link to all of the times I have written about the overall idea of using awards lists [not juts the winners] as a RA Resource for everything we do from displays to suggestions, to educating ourselves, collection development, and more.

Personally, I am, especially excited about the Translated nominees. I finished one over the weekend [I had begun it before the announcement] and already had another on hold.