Readers often face extreme challenges in discovering new authors and books. Some websites, such as Goodreads, are often a good avenue, but they are challenging when you want to read a different genre. Some patrol Amazon’s bestseller lists, but normally, it’s the same authors and books, such as Harry Potter or Colleen Hoover. Book awards are often the best ones since you can easily look at new books you might not have heard of before. The National Book Awards Finalists have just been announced for 2024.
The finalists span a myriad of genres. The New York Times announced the five Finalists in each category: fiction, nonfiction, poetry, translated literature, and young people’s literature. A distinguished panel of judges selected the five finalists in each category, which were advanced from the Longlists announced in September by The New Yorker.
Finalists for Fiction:
Pemi Aguda, Ghostroots
Norton / W. W. Norton & Company
Kaveh Akbar, Martyr!
Knopf / Penguin Random House
Percival Everett, James
Doubleday / Penguin Random House
Miranda July, All Fours
Riverhead Books / Penguin Random House
Hisham Matar, My Friends
Random House / Penguin Random House
Finalists for Nonfiction:
Jason De León, Soldiers and Kings: Survival and Hope in the World of Human Smuggling
Viking Books / Penguin Random House
Eliza Griswold, Circle of Hope: A Reckoning with Love, Power, and Justice in an American Church
Farrar, Straus and Giroux / Macmillan Publishers
Kate Manne, Unshrinking: How to Face Fatphobia
Crown / Penguin Random House
Salman Rushdie, Knife: Meditations After an Attempted Murder
Random House / Penguin Random House
Deborah Jackson Taffa, Whiskey Tender
Harper / HarperCollins Publishers
Finalists for Poetry:
Anne Carson, Wrong Norma
New Directions Publishing
Fady Joudah, […]
Milkweed Editions
m.s. RedCherries, mother
Penguin Books / Penguin Random House
Diane Seuss, Modern Poetry
Graywolf Press
Lena Khalaf Tuffaha, Something About Living
University of Akron Press
Finalists for Translated Literature:
Bothayna Al-Essa, The Book Censor’s Library
Translated from the Arabic by Ranya Abdelrahman and Sawad Hussain
Restless Books
Linnea Axelsson, Ædnan
Translated from the Swedish by Saskia Vogel
Knopf / Penguin Random House
Fiston Mwanza Mujila, The Villain’s Dance
Translated from the French by Roland Glasser
Deep Vellum / Deep Vellum Publishing
Yáng Shuāng-zǐ, Taiwan Travelogue
Translated from the Mandarin Chinese by Lin King
Graywolf Press
Samar Yazbek, Where the Wind Calls Home
Translated from the Arabic by Leri Price
World Editions
Finalists for Young People’s Literature:
Violet Duncan, Buffalo Dreamer
Nancy Paulsen Books / Penguin Random House
Josh Galarza, The Great Cool Ranch Dorito in the Sky
Henry Holt and Company (BYR) / Macmillan Publishers
Shifa Saltagi Safadi, Kareem Between
G.P. Putnam’s Sons Books for Young Readers / Penguin Random House
Angela Shanté, The Unboxing of a Black Girl
Page Street Publishing
Michael Kozlowski is the editor-in-chief at Good e-Reader and has written about audiobooks and e-readers for the past fifteen years. Newspapers and websites such as the CBC, CNET, Engadget, Huffington Post and the New York Times have picked up his articles. He Lives in Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada.
