Using Awards Lists As a RA Tool: National Book Award Edition

This is part of my ongoing series on using Awards Lists as a RA tool. Click here for all posts in the series in reverse chronological order. Click here for the first post which outlines the details how to use awards lists as a RA tool.  

Last week the National Book Foundation released their long lists for the National Book Award. Along with my usual reminder to use these lists and their backlists especially to help patrons in a variety of ways, I want to point out the breadth of categories for this award.

Because it has categories in Fiction, Nonfiction, Translated Literature, Poetry, and Young People's literature, the National Book Award can help an extremely wide range of readers by default.

However, it is not just the range of categories, the nominees in these long lists are also among the most accesible of titles nominated for major awards. The fiction and nonfiction titles, as usual, are solid suggestions for a general audience, they are NOT overly literary or obtuse. And as usual the translated titles are excellent options, especially as interest in translated titles grow and our resources are not keeping up. 

From top to bottom, the books listed here should be owned by every public library and handed out frequently to general readers.

Backlist access of nominees and winners is very easily accessible and pleasant to browse, here as well. Of course, because of the breadth of titles always considered, this backlist access is extremely helpful for displays and suggestions all year long. Combine this with my "American Voices" idea from earlier this month as well.

Use the links above to explore the National Book Foundations' excellent web presence, but for a succinct report on the titles making the long list, click here for PW's coverage.

The National Book Foundation is announcing the 2022 National Book Award longlists this week. Five finalists in each of the five categories—fiction, nonfiction, poetry, translated literature, and young people's literature—will be named October 3. The winners will be announced during an awards ceremony on November 15.

Fiction 

• Chain-Gang All-Stars by Nana Kwame Adjei-Brenyah (Pantheon)
• Temple Folk by Aaliyah Bilal (S&S)
• Ponyboy by Eliot Duncan (Norton) 
• This Other Eden by Paul Harding (Norton) 
• Loot by Tania James (Knopf)
• Night Watch by Jayne Anne Phillips (Knopf) 
• A Council of Dolls by Mona Susan Power (Mariner)
• The End of Drum-Time by Hanna Pylväinen (Holt)
• Blackouts by Justin Torres (FSG)
• Holler, Child by LaToya Watkins (Tiny Reparations)

Nonfiction

• The Rediscovery of America: Native Peoples and the Unmaking of U.S. History by Ned Blackhawk (Yale UP)
• King: A Life by Jonathan Eig (FSG)
• A Man of Two Faces: A Memoir, A History, A Memorial by Viet Thanh Nguyen (Grove)
• The Slip: The New York City Street That Changed American Art Forever by Prudence Peiffer (Harper)
• When Crack Was King: A People's History of a Misunderstood Era by Donovan X. Ramsey (One World)
• Liliana’s Invincible Summer: A Sister’s Search for Justice by Cristina Rivera Garza (Hogarth)
• Ordinary Notes by Christina Sharpe (FSG)
• We Could Have Been Friends, My Father and I: A Palestinian Memoir by Raja Shehadeh (Other Press)
• Fire Weather: A True Story from a Hotter World by John Vaillant (Knopf)
• I Saw Death Coming: A History of Terror and Survival in the War Against Reconstructionby Kidada E. Williams (Bloomsbury)

Poetry

• How to Communicate by John Lee Clark (Norton)
• The Diaspora Sonnets by Oliver de la Paz (Liveright)
• Vexations by Annelyse Gelman (University of Chicago)
• Promises of Gold by José Olivarez (Holt) 
• from unincorporated territory [åmot] by Craig Santos Perez (Omnidawn)
• West: A Translation by Paisley Rekdal (Copper Canyon)
• Tripas by Brandon Som (Georgia Review)
• Trace Evidence by Charif Shanahan (Tin House)
• suddenly we by Evie Shockley (Wesleyan UP)
• From From by Monica Youn (Graywolf)

Translated Literature

• The Devil of the Provinces by Juan Cárdenas and translated from the Spanish by Lizzie Davis (Coffee House)
• Cursed Bunny by Bora Chung and translated from the Korean by Anton Hur (Algonquin)
• Beyond the Door of No Return by David Diop and translated from the French by Sam Taylor (FSG)
• Kairos by Jenny Erpenbeck and translated from the German by Michael Hofmann (New Directions)
• The Words That Remain by Stênio Gardel and translated from the Portuguese by Bruna Dantas Lobato (New Vessel)
• No One Prayed Over Their Graves by Khaled Khalifa and translated from the Arabic by Leri Price (FSG)
• This Is Not Miami by Fernanda Melchor and translated from the Spanish by Sophie Hughes (New Directions)
• Abyss by Pilar Quintana and translated from the Spanish by Lisa Dillman (World Editions)
• On a Woman’s Madness by Astrid Roemer and tanslated from the Dutch by Lucy Scott (Two Lines) 
• The Most Secret Memory of Men by Mohamed Mbougar Sarr and translated from the French by Lara Vergnaud (Other Press)

Young People's Literature

• Simon Sort of Says by Erin Bow (Disney-Hyperion)
• Gather by Kenneth M. Cadow (Candlewick)
• Forget Me Not by Alyson Derrick (Simon & Schuster)
• Huda F Cares? by Huda Fahmy (Dial)
• Big by Vashti Harrison (Little, Brown)
• The Lost Year: A Survival Story of the Ukrainian Famine by Katherine Marsh (Roaring Brook)
• Hidden Systems: Water, Electricity, the Internet, and the Secrets Behind the Systems We Use Every Day by Dan Nott (Random House Graphic)
• A First Time for Everything by Dan Santat (First Second)
• Parachute Kids by Betty C. Tang (Graphix)
• More Than a Dream: The Radical March on Washington for Jobs and Freedom by Yohuru Williams and Michael G. Long (Farrar, Straus and Giroux)

A total of 496 books were submitted for the 2023 National Book Award for Fiction. The judges are Steph Cha, Calvin Crosby, Silas House, Mat Johnson (chair), and Helena María Viramontes.

A total of 638 books were submitted for the 2023 National Book Award for Nonfiction. The judges are Hanif Abdurraqib, Ada Ferrer (chair), James Fugate, Sarah Schulman, and Sonia Shah.

A total of 295 books were submitted for the 2023 National Book Award for Poetry. The judges are Rick Barot, Heid E. Erdrich (chair), Jonathan Farmer, Raina J. León, and Solmaz Sharif.

A total of 154 books were submitted for the 2023 National Book Award for Translated Literature. The judges are Geoffrey Brock, Arthur Malcolm Dixon, Cristina Rodriguez, T. Denean Sharpley-Whiting, and Jeremy Tiang (chair).

A total of 348 books were submitted for the 2023 National Book Award for Young People's Literature. The judges are Claudette S. McLinn (chair), Sarah Park Dahlen, Kyle Lukoff, justin a. reynolds, and Sabaa Tahir.