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October 5, 2021By Katy Hershberger

National Book Award Shortlists

October 5, 2021By Katy Hershberger

The National Book Award finalists were announced on Tuesday. The winners will be announced at a virtual ceremony on November 17.

Fiction
Cloud Cuckoo Land, Anthony Doerr (Scribner)
Matrix, Lauren Groff (Riverhead)*
Zorrie, Laird Hunt (Bloomsbury)
The Prophets, Robert Jones Jr. (Putnam)**
Hell of a Book, Jason Mott (Dutton)

Nonfiction
A Little Devil in America: Notes in Praise of Black Performance, Hanif Abdurraqib (Random House)
Running Out: In Search of Water on the High Plains, Lucas Bessire (Princeton University Press)
Tastes Like War: A Memoir, Grace M. Cho (Feminist Press)
Covered With Night: A Story of Murder and Indigenous Justice in Early America, Nicole Eustace (Norton)
All That She Carried: The Journey of Ashley’s Sack, a Black Family Keepsake, Tiya Miles (Random House)

Poetry
What Noise Against the Cane, Desiree C. Bailey (Yale University Press)
Floaters, Martín Espada (Norton)
Sho, Douglas Kearney (Wave Books)
A Thousand Times You Lose Your Treasure, Hoa Nguyen (Wave Books)
The Sunflower Cast a Spell to Save Us From the Void, Jackie Wang (Nightboat Books)

Translated Literature
Winter in Sokcho, Elisa Shua Dusapin. Translated from the French by Aneesa Abbas Higgins (Open Letter)
Peach Blossom Paradise, Ge Fei. Translated from the Chinese by Canaan Morse (New York Review Books)
The Twilight Zone, Nona Fernández. Translated from the Spanish by Natasha Wimmer (Graywolf)
When We Cease to Understand the World, Benjamín Labatut. Translated from the Spanish by Adrian Nathan West (New York Review Books)
Planet of Clay, Samar Yazbek. Translated from the Arabic by Leri Price (World Editions)

Young People’s Literature
The Legend of Auntie Po, Shing Yin Khor (Kokila)
Last Night at the Telegraph Club, Malinda Lo (Dutton Books for Young Readers)
Too Bright to See, Kyle Lukoff (Dial Books for Young Readers)
Revolution in Our Time: The Black Panther Party’s Promise to the People, Kekla Magoon (Candlewick Press)
Me (Moth), Amber McBride (Feiwel and Friends)

*Excerpted in our Buzz Books 2021: Spring/Summer sampler
**Excerpted in our Buzz Books 2020: Fall/Winter sampler

Filed Under: Uncategorized

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