Book Critics award finalists include Ta-Nehisi Coates, Paul Beatty, Mary Beard, more
Ta-Nehisi Coatesâ acclaimed book, âBetween the World and Me,â is a finalist for the National Book Critics Circle Award for Criticism.
The board of the National Book Critics Circle -- on which I sit -- met Saturday in New York to select the finalists for our 2015 awards. Monday we announced that five finalists have been chosen in six categories: Autobiography, Biography, Criticism, Fiction, Nonficton and Poetry.
Among the finalists are Ta-Nehisi Coates, winner of a MacArthur âgeniusâ fellowship and National Book Award winner, for âBetween the World and Meâ (Criticism); Booker Prize winner Helen Macdonald for âH is for Hawkâ (Autobiography); Paul Beatty for âThe Sellout,â a satire of race set in Los Angeles (Fiction); historian Mary Beardâs âSPQR: A History of Romeâ (Nonfiction); Frank Stanfordâs âWhat About This: Collected Poems of Frank Stanfordâ (Poetry); and Karin Wieland for âDietrich and Riefenstahl: Hollywood, Berlin, and a Century in Two Livesâ (Biography).
Additionally, the recipients of three awards are being announced. Poet and activist Wendell Berry will receive the Ivan Sandrof Award for Lifetime Achievement; Kirstin Valdez Quade will be awarded the John Leonard First Book Prize for âNight at the Fiestasâ; and the Washington Postâs Carlos Lozada will receive the Nona Balakian Citation for Excellence in Reviewing.
All the awards will be presented at a ceremony at the New School in New York on March 17 at 6 p.m. The event and a reception that follows are open to the public; tickets are $75.
The complete list of NBCC finalists is below.
AUTOBIOGRAPHY
Elizabeth Alexander, âThe Light of the Worldâ (Grand Central Publishing)
Vivian Gornick, âThe Odd Woman and the Cityâ (Farrar, Straus and Giroux)
George Hodgman, âBettyvilleâ (Viking)
Margo Jefferson, âNegrolandâ (Pantheon)
Helen Macdonald, âH Is for Hawkâ (Grove Press)
BIOGRAPHY
Terry Alford, âFortuneâs Fool: The Life of John Wilkes Boothâ (Oxford University Press)
Charlotte Gordon, âRomantic Outlaws: The Extraordinary Lives of Mary Wollstonecraft and Her Daughter Mary Shelleyâ (Random House)
T.J. Stiles, âCusterâs Trials: A Life on the Frontier of a New Americaâ (Alfred A. Knopf)
Rosemary Sullivan, âStalinâs Daughter: The Extraordinary and Tumultuous Life of Svetlana Alliluyevaâ (Harper)
Karin Wieland and Shelly Frisch, âDietrich and Riefenstahl: Hollywood, Berlin, and a Century in Two Livesâ (Liveright)
CRITICISM
Ta-Nehisi Coates, âBetween the World and Meâ (Spiegel & Grau)
Leo Damrosch, âEternityâs Sunrise: The Imaginative World of William Blakeâ (Yale University Press)
Maggie Nelson, âThe Argonautsâ (Graywolf)
Colm TĂłibĂn, âOn Elizabeth Bishopâ (Princeton University Press)
James Wood, âThe Nearest Thing to Lifeâ (Brandeis University Press)
FICTION
Paul Beatty, âThe Selloutâ (Farrar, Straus and Giroux)
Lauren Groff, âFates and Furiesâ (Riverhead)
Valeria Luiselli, âThe Story of My Teethâ (Coffee House Press)
Anthony Marra, âThe Tsar of Love and Technoâ (Hogarth)
Ottessa Moshfegh, âEileenâ (Penguin Press)
GENERAL NONFICTION
Mary Beard, âSPQR: A History of Romeâ (Liveright)
Ari Berman, âGive Us the Ballot: The Modern Struggle for Voting Rights in Americaâ (Farrar, Straus and Giroux)
Jill Leovy, âGhettoside: A True Story of Murder in Americaâ (Spiegel & Grau)
Sam Quinones, âDreamland: The True Story of Americaâs Opiate Epidemicâ (Bloomsbury)
Brian Seibert, âWhat the Eye Hears: A History of Tap Dancingâ (Farrar, Straus and Giroux)
POETRY
Ross Gay, âCatalogue of Unabashed Gratitudeâ (University of Pittsburgh Press)
Terrance Hayes, âHow to Be Drawnâ (Penguin)
Ada LimĂłn, âBright Dead Thingsâ (Milkweed Editions)
SinĂ©ad Morrissey, âParallax and Selected Poemsâ (Farrar, Straus and Giroux)
Frank Stanford, âWhat About This: Collected Poems of Frank Stanfordâ (Copper Canyon Press)
JOHN LEONARD PRIZE
Kirstin Valdez Quade, âNight at the Fiestasâ (W.W. Norton & Company)
IVAN SANDROF LIFETIME ACHIEVEMENT AWARD
Wendell Berry
NONA BALAKIAN CITATION FOR EXCELLENCE IN REVIEWING
Carlos Lozada
Finalists for the Nona Balakian Citation for Excellence in Reviewing:
Ruth Franklin
James Parker
Leo Robson
Roxana Robinson
Book news and more; Iâm @paperhaus on Twitter
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