The National Book Foundation is releasing longlists for the 2026 National Book Awards this week, beginning with the Young People's Literature and Translated Literature categories. Finalists will be announced on October 6, and winners named on November 18 at the 77th National Book Awards Ceremony. The longlisted in these categories titles are:
Young People's Literature
The Free Verse Society by Delali Adjoa (Peachtree Teen)
Holloway by Elana K. Arnold (Clarion Books)
The Celestial Seas by T. A. Chan (Viking Books for Young Readers)
When Tomorrow Burns by Tae Keller (Random House Books for Young Readers)
That Which Feeds Us: A Hawaiian Gothic by Keala Kendall (Random House Books for Young Readers)
The Fight of Our Lives: AIDS in America by David Levithan & Gabriel Duckels (Knopf Books for Young Readers)
The Moon Without Stars by Chanel Miller (Philomel Books)
Clothes to Make You Smile: Patrick Kelly Designs His Dreams by Eric Darnell Pritchard, illustrated by Shannon Wright (Abrams Books for Young Readers)
Shook by Julian Randall (Holt Books for Young Readers)
Life on the Moon by Matthew Swanson, illustrated by Robbi Behr (Knopf Books for Young Readers)
Translated Literature
My Dreadful Body by Egana Djabbarova, translated from the Russian by Lisa C. Hayden (New Vessel Press)
Now I Surrender by Álvaro Enrigue, translated from the Spanish by Natasha Wimmer (Riverhead Books)
Eden at Dawn by Karim Kattan, translated from the French by Jeffrey Zuckerman (Restless Books)
The School of Night by Karl Ove Knausgaard, translated from the Norwegian by Martin Aitken (Penguin Press)
To the East of the East by Ping Lu, translated from the Chinese by Jeremy Tiang (World Editions)
Centroeuropa by Vicente Luis Mora, translated from the Spanish by Rahul Bery (Bellevue Literary Press)
Night of a Thousand Hells by Intan Paramaditha, translated from the Indonesian by Stephen Epstein & Tiffany Tsao (Europa Editions)
Pure Men by Mohamed Mbougar Sarr, translated from the French by Lara Vergnaud (Other Press)
The Disappearing Act by Maria Stepanova, translated from the Russian by Sasha Dugdale (New Directions)
Your Presence Is a Danger to Your Life: Voices of Survival and Witness in Gaza by Samar Yazbek, translated from the Arabic by Leri Price (Other Press)