On November 18, the National Book Foundation presented its National Book Awards for fiction, nonfiction, poetry, translated literature, and young people’s literature in a virtual ceremony hosted by author Jason Reynolds.
Listed below are the winners and finalists in each category, with excerpts from the winners’ Booklist reviews (where available).
Fiction
Interior Chinatown by Charles Yu (winner)
“Although the cover claims that Yu’s (Sorry Please Thank You, 2012) latest is a novel, his fiction, as always, defies easy labels. This hybrid conflates history, sociology, and ethnography with the timeless evils of racism, sexism, and elitism in a multigenerational epic that’s both rollicking entertainment and scathing commentary…. Resembling a script, complete with a classic typewriter font, Yu’s tale ingeniously draws on real-life Hollywood dead ends for Asian American actors, including, quite possibly, Kelvin Yu, the author’s younger brother.” —Terry Hong
Leave the World Behind by Rumaan Alam
A Children’s Bible by Lydia Millet
The Secret Lives of Church Ladies by Deesha Philyaw
Shuggie Bain by Douglas Stuart
Nonfiction
The Dead Are Arising: The Life of Malcolm X by Les Payne and Tamara Payne (winner)
“As renewed calls for Black liberation fill the streets and the airwaves, what better time to review the legacy of one of the most influential proponents of Black independence, Malcolm X. Based on decades of interviews with family members, classmates, and associates, this monumental new biography was Les Payne’s life work, completed by his daughter and fellow researcher Tamara after Payne’s untimely death in 2018. So what distinguishes Payne’s book from other Malcolm X biographies? Payne’s Malcolm is less a revolutionary than part of a continuum of Black struggle, beginning with Malcolm’s parents and their devotion to the Black uplift of Garveyism, through the myth-making of a gloriously exotic Black ancestry found in the Moorish Science movement, a precursor to the Nation of Islam.”—Lesley Williams
Unworthy Republic: The Dispossession of Native Americans and the Road to Indian Territory by Claudio Saunt
My Autobiography of Carson McCullors by Jenn Shapland
The Undocumented Americans by Karla Cornejo Villavicencio
How to Make a Slave and Other Essays by Jerald Walker
Translated Literature
Tokyo Ueno Station by Yu Miri and Morgan Giles (winner)
“Kazu is dead, but his spirit can’t rest. As he wanders through Tokyo’s Imperial Gift Park—where he last lived as a homeless wanderer—memories, visions, and hauntings reveal his past. That his 1933 birth coincided with Emperor Akihito’s, followed by the birth of their respective sons on the same day in 1960, was supposed to be a ‘blessing,’ but tragedy repeatedly marked the decades…. Yu (Gold Rush, 2002), an ethnic Korean in Japan, is no stranger to modern society’s traps driven by nationalism, capitalism, classism, and sexism. Her anglophoned latest (gratitude to translator Giles for providing fluent accessibility) is a surreal fable of splintered families, disintegrating relationships, and the casual devaluation of humanity.”—Terry Hong
High as the Waters Rise by Anja Kampmann and Anne Posten
The Family Clause by Jonas Hassen Khemiri and Alice Menzies
The Bitch by Pilar Quintana and Lisa Dillman
Minor Detail by Adania Shibli and Elisabeth Jaquette
Young People’s Literature
King and the Dragonflies by Kacen Callender (winner)
“This incredible middle-grade follow-up to Callender’s debut novel Hurricane Child (2018) delves into one boy’s journey to self-acceptance while wading through the profound grief that has engulfed his family. King, a Black child living by the bayous of Louisiana, is dealt the double blow of losing his beloved older brother while trying to contain an identity he is sure will cause his father to stop loving him. When his former best friend, the gay son of the local sheriff, runs away, the weight of expectations and secrets leads King to examine everything he thinks he knows about being brave, being a man, and being himself.” —Shaunterria Owens
We Are Not Free by Traci Chee
Every Body Looking by Candice Iloh
When Stars are Scattered by Omar Mohamed and Victoria Jamieson
The Way Back by Gavriel Savit
Poetry
DMZ Colony by Don Mee Choi (winner)
A Treatise on Stars by Mei-mei Berssenbrugge
Fantasia for the Man in Blue by Tommye Blount
Borderland Apocrypha by Anthony Cody
Postcolonial Love Poem by Natalie Diaz
