Suspend Your Disbelief

Posts Tagged ‘National Book Award’

Shop Talk |

Do the National Book Foundation's new procedures for choosing finalists crowd out small-press writers?

This week, the National Book Foundation revised the procedures for choosing National Book Award winners. Previously, lists of five finalists were announced in the weeks leading up to the awards. The new template involves “long-listing” ten finalists in each category, to create more buzz about the possible winners, NBF representatives say. The pool of judges will also expand to include critics and booksellers. Does this sound familiar? It should. The NBF has borrowed ideas from the Booker Prize as well as the Oscars. Initially, Morgan Entrekin, the vice president of the NBF board and Grove/ Atlantic Press CEO, caused a […]


Reviews |

[Reviewlet] The Buddha in the Attic, by Julie Otsuka

by Anne Clinard Barnhill

A finalist for the National Book Award, Julie Otsuka’s innovative novel The Buddha in the Attic pushes the bounds of narrative form with a collective narrator and a resistance to fixed fates. By inviting the reader to consider what could have happened, instead of what did, Otsuka makes her complicit in the fate of the story’s mail-order-brides.


Shop Talk |

Jesmyn Ward wins National Book Award for fiction!

by Celeste Ng

HUGE congratulations to friend of FWR Jesmyn Ward, who just won the 2011 National Book Award for fiction for her novel Salvage the Bones! In reviewing Ward’s novel, Ron Charles wrote in the Washington Post, When the finalists for the National Book Award in Fiction were announced last month, I’m embarrassed to admit that I was among those critics grumbling about the obscurity of some of the authors (Andrew Krivak?), even some of the publishers (Lookout Books?). […] I’m happy to eat my words. And my spinach. I’ve just read another one of the so-called obscure finalists, “Salvage the Bones […]


Shop Talk |

Hot off the Presses: 2011 National Book Award Finalists Announced!

by Jeremiah Chamberlin

Approximately one hour ago, the finalists for this year’s National Book Awards were announced on Oregon Public Broadcasting’s morning radio program, Think Out Loud. The event took place in front of a live audience at the new Literary Arts Center in Portland, Oregon, at approximately 9am Pacific Time. And we’re pleased to announce that some of our favorite fiction titles last year have been selected. Congratulations to: Fiction: Andrew Krivak for The Sojourn Tea Obreht for The Tiger’s Wife Julie Otsuka for The Buddha in the Attic Edith Pearlman for Binocular Vision: New & Selected Stories Jesmyn Ward for Salvage […]


Shop Talk |

And the winner is ….

by Lee Thomas

Tonight, the National Book Award will be announced. The National Book Foundation – who awards the prize each year – will be live tweeting the event “from pre-show setup to post show celebration.” Anne shared an interesting piece from Salon that posted on Monday. In the aptly-titled essay, “Who will win the National Book Award for fiction?“, Tom LeClair breaks down the five books in the running – Parrot and Olivier in America by Peter Carey; Lord of Misrule by Jaimy Gordon; Great House by Nicole Krauss; So Much for That by Lionel Shriver; and I Hotel by Karen Tei […]



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