Using Awards Lists As a RA Tool: National Book Critics Circle 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.  

Well there sure were a lot of awards lists over the last week or so. I think I am through the backlog, for now. 

The National Book Critics Circle Award Finalists were announced here. Since 1974, the NBCC, made up of mostly literary critics, honors outstanding writing and fosters a national conversation about reading, criticism, and literature. 

The finalists are in 8 categories:

• Fiction
• Nonfiction
• Biography 
• Autobiography
• Poetry
• Criticism
• John Leonard Prize-- Best First Books
• Gregg Barrios Book in Translation

Of note, the John Leonard Prize is for any first book, not just fiction. I find that fascinating. I believe it is the only award that is given for simply a first book, full stop.

Also, the separation of nonfiction, biography, and autobiography not only allows for more nonfiction to be honored, but is acknowledges the big difference between biography and autobiography both the obvious distinction of how it is written and the fact that the appeal for readers is different as well.

I always like comparing the National Book Award finalists to the NBCC. They are fairly similar, but you can see distinctions, especially if you follow reviews as I do. The NBA is chosen by a group of mostly authors, while the NBCC is driven by the critics. You can especially see trends emerging over time if you look at both. Thankfully, both awards make the backlist easy to access. [There is a box on the top right gutter of the "Awards" page for the NBCC.]

This year for example, while James is on both lists, the other nominees are all different. This gives you many more "best" options for readers. Add in the Booker Prize and you get the big picture view of the best books published in English in any given year.

While "best" books aren't always the most popular with readers, they are the harbinger of larger movements. For example, as award finalists have gotten more diverse, the demand for more titles by marginalized voices has made it way into the conversation about all books.

Also, the emergence of small presses into the larger spotlight is another trend that I have noticed. Here we see Two Dollar Radio with a best novel nomination. But go down the whole list, there are a bunch of very small presses with nominations here.

So use this award list as a resource as I note in the introduction to this post above, but also, think about grouping similar awards together, consider their backlists from the last 5 years, and see if you can notice a few trends or changes yourself. When we embrace trends and larger movements as they are developing, we show our patrons we understand them. Anticipating what they want is not that hard if you pay attention and it leads to more check outs.

All of our work with readers starts with resources, and awards lists are one of my favorite resources.