The finalists for the National Book Award were just announced in Fiction, Nonfiction, Poetry and Young People's Literature. Visit the
National Book Foundation's website for complete lists of each category.
Finalists in the fiction category offered a mixture of veterans and new authors. The five nominees include
Home, the third novel by Marilynne Robinson, a Pulitzer Prize-winner for her 2004 novel
Gilead;
Shadow Country, by Peter Matthiessen, a founder of The Paris Review and a National Book Award winner in 1979 for his nonfiction work
The Snow Leopard; and
The Lazarus Project, by the Bosnian author Aleksandar Hemon. They are joined by Rachel Kushner's debut novel,
Telex From Cuba, and
The End, a first novel by Salvatore Scibona, published by the independent house Graywolf Press.
The nonfiction finalists include
This Republic of Suffering: Death and the American Civil War by Drew Gilpin Faust;
The Dark Side: The Inside Story of How the War on Terror Turned into a War on American Ideals by Jane Mayer; and
Final Salute: A Story of Unfinished Lives by Jim Sheeler.
Interesting Fact: In 2008, over 200 publishers submitted 1,258 books for the 2008 National Book Awards, an increase of six percent from 2007.
Winners in each category will be announced at a ceremony on November 19th in New York.
