The National Book Critics Circle has unveiled 30 finalists in six categories--autobiography, biography, criticism, fiction, nonfiction and poetry--for the best books of 2016. The awards will be presented March 16 in New York City.
Also NBCC announced that Margaret Atwood has won the Ivan Sandrof Lifetime Achievement and said, in part, "Her lifetime contribution to letters and book culture include groundbreaking fiction, environmental and feminist activism, and service to community as a cofounder of the Writers' Trust of Canada."
Homegoing by Yaa Gyasi (Knopf) has won the John Leonard Prize, which recognizes "outstanding first books in any genre."
Michelle Dean has won the 2016 Nona Balakian Citation for Excellence in Reviewing. NBCC wrote that "Dean's journalism and criticism appears regularly in the Guardian, the New Republic, and a host of other venues. Originally trained as a lawyer, she has been a full-time writer since 2012. Her book about women critics and intellectuals, titled Sharp: The Women Who Made an Art of Having an Opinion, is forthcoming from Grove Atlantic."
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Ten titles have been nominated for this year's Plutarch Award, an award for a biography that is chosen by fellow biographers, members of BIO. The nominees are:
Bobby Kennedy: The Making of a Liberal Icon by Larry Tye
The Feud: Vladimir Nabokov, Edmund Wilson, and the End of a Beautiful Friendship by Alex Beam
Guilty Thing: A Life of Thomas De Quincey by Frances Wilson
His Final Battle: The Last Months of Franklin Roosevelt by Joseph Lelyveld
Hitler: Ascent, 1889-1939 by Volker Ullrich
John Aubrey, My Own Life by Ruth Scurr
Kafka: The Early Years by Reiner Stach, translated by Shelley Frisch
Louisa: The Extraordinary Life of Mrs. Adams by Louisa Thomas
Orson Welles, Volume 3: One-Man Band by Simon Callow
Shirley Jackson: A Rather Haunted Life by Ruth Franklin
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The longlist for the International Prize for Arabic Fiction 2017 has been announced. To see the 16 titles, click here. The shortlist will be announced on February 16, and the winner on April 25.