The National Book Award nominees were announced earlier this week. The fiction nominees are:
E.L. Doctorow, The March (Random House)
Mary Gaitskill, Veronica (Pantheon)
Christopher Sorrentino, Trance
(Farrar, Straus and Giroux)
Renè Steinke, Holy Skirts (William Morrow)
William T. Vollmann, Europe Central (Viking)
It's definitely an improvement over last year's list. No doubt Ed and others are delighted to see the inclusion of Vollmann (as are we, despite not always embracing everything he does). All the books have been on our radar this year (we've only actually read into Trance thus far but have two of the others already), and the list strikes us as having some genuine range in ages and styles and voices. Between the Booker and the NBA and the Nobel, it's been a decidedly interesting year for prizes ...
The winner will be announced November 16.
I would have liked to have seen Alice Munro's Runaway on the list, but what's on there is OK.
Posted by: The literary thug | October 15, 2005 at 04:54 PM
Would like to add your blog to the National Book Awards press list to receive info about all award-related activities. If you're interested, please forward your email address.
Posted by: Sherrie Young | September 21, 2007 at 02:00 PM