(Image via nationalbook.org)

Editor: Alexandra D’Eon

Email: adeon@umassd.edu 

The 75th National Book Awards is set to take place on November 20 in New York City.

The National Book Awards takes place annually, crowning the best book of each genre and giving out two lifetime achievement awards to authors. Each winner will receive $10,000 and a bronze statue commemorating their achievement.

Those who don’t win their category but are elected as a finalist receive $1,000.

There are five categories: Fiction, Non-Fiction, Poetry, Translated Literature, and Young People’s Literature. In each of the five categories, there are five nominees, and overall, there are 25 books up for an award. 

In just the fiction category alone, there were 671 books submitted to be judged.

This year, the two authors receiving the Lifetime Achievement Award are Barbara Kingsolver and W. Paul Coates. Kingsolver is a Pulitzer Prize winning author who will be given the National Book Foundation’s Medal for Distinguished Contribution to American Letters. Coates is the founder and director of the Black Classic Press, and he will be recognized at this with the Foundation’s Literarian Award for Outstanding Service to the American Literary Community.

Leri Price and Samar Yazbek are up for their second nomination. The remaining authors and translators have never been previously selected. 

The winners will be selected by a panel of judges in each category. There are five judges in each panel who must read each book and select which one they deem the best.

Before the award ceremony on November 20th, an event is open to the public on November 19th. The event is held by NYU Skirball, affiliated with the National Book Foundation and the NYU Creative Writing Program. 

At this event, the authors will read excerpts from their nominated works, giving the public a chance to hear each selection before the winners are announced. 

Tickets are being sold for this event if you are interested. It will be held at 7 PM on November 19th at the Jack H. Skirball Center For The Performing Arts in Manhattan. 

The following day, the winners will be announced at the National Book Awards ceremony and benefit dinner, a private invite-only event. 

The following is a list of nominees for each category:

Fiction

Ghostroots by ‘Pemi Aguda

Martyr! by Kaveh Akbar 

James by Percival Everett

All Fours by Miranda July 

My Friends by Hisham Matar

Non-Fiction

Soldiers and Kings: Survival and Hope in the World of Human Smuggling by Jason De León 

Circle of Hope: A Reckoning With Love, Power, and Justice in an American Church by Eliza Griswold

Unshrinking: How to Face Fatphobia by Kate Manne 

Knife: Meditations After an Attempted Murder by Salman Rushdie

Whiskey Tender by Deborah Jackson Taffa

Poetry

Wrong Norma by Anne Carson 

[…] by Fady Joudah

mother by m.s. RedCherries

Modern Poetry by Diane Seuss

Something About Living by Lena Khalaf Tuffaha

Translated Literature

The Book Censor’s Library by Bothayna Al-Essa, translated from Arabic by Ranya Abdelrahman and Sawad Hussain

Ædnan by Linnea Axelsson, translated from Swedish by Saskia Vogel 

The Villain’s Dance by Fiston Mwanza Mujila, translated from French by Roland Glasser

Taiwan Travelogue by Yáng Shuāng-zǐ, translated from Mandarin Chinese by Lin King

Where the Wind Calls Home by Samar Yazbek, translated from Arabic by Leri Price 

Young People’s Literature

Buffalo Dreamer by Violet Duncan 

The Great Cool Ranch Dorito in the Sky by Josh Galarza

The First State of Being by Erin Entrada Kelly

Kareem Between by Shifa Saltagi Safadi 

The Unboxing of a Black Girl by Angela Shanté