2007 National Book Award Finalists Announced

Posted Wednesday, Oct 10, 2007

On Wednesday, October 10, the National Book Foundation announced the finalists for this year's National Book Awards. Author and social critic Camille Paglia made the announcement at the Library Company in Philadelphia. The winner in each of the four categories -- Fiction, Nonfiction, Poetry, and Young People's Literature -- will be announced at the National Book Awards Benefit Dinner and Ceremony in Manhattan on November 14. Each winner receives $10,000 plus a bronze statue; each finalist received a bronze medal and a $1,000 cash award.

This year's finalists are:

FICTION

  • Mischa Berlinski, Fieldwork (FSG)
  • Lydia Davis, Varieties of Disturbance (FSG)
  • Joshua Ferris, Then We Came to the End (Little, Brown)
  • Denis Johnson, Tree of Smoke (FSG)
  • Jim Shepard, Like You'd Understand, Anyway (Knopf)

NONFICTION

  • Edwidge Danticat, Brother, I'm Dying (Knopf)
  • Christopher Hitchens, God Is Not Great: How Religion Poisons Everything (Twelve/Hachette)
  • Woody Holton, Unruly Americans and the Origins of the Constitution (Hill and Wang/FSG)
  • Arnold Rampersad, Ralph Ellison: A Biography (Knopf)
  • Tim Weiner, Legacy of Ashes: The History of the CIA (Doubleday)

POETRY

  • Linda Gregerson, Magnetic North (Houghton Mifflin)
  • Robert Hass, Time and Materials (Ecco/HarperCollins)
  • David Kirby, The House on Boulevard St. (Louisiana State University Press)
  • Stanley Plumly, Old Heart (Norton)
  • Ellen Bryant Voigt, Messenger: New and Selected Poems 1976 - 2006 (Norton)

YOUNG PEOPLE'S LITERATURE

  • Sherman Alexie, The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian (Little, Brown) -- The #1 Fall 2007 Book Sense Children's Pick
  • Kathleen Duey, Skin Hunger: A Resurrection of Magic, Book One (Atheneum Books for Young Readers)
  • M. Sindy Felin, Touching Snow (Atheneum Books for Young Readers)
  • Brian Selznick, The Invention of Hugo Cabret (Scholastic) -- The #1 Spring 2007 Book Sense Children's Pick
  • Sara Zarr, Story of a Girl (Little, Brown)

The foundation also announced Joan Didion as the recipient of the Medal for Distinguished Contribution to American Letters, and Terry Gross as the recipient of this year's Literarian Award for Outstanding Service to the American Literary Community.

To be eligible for a 2007 National Book Award, a book must have been published in the U.S. between December 1, 2006, and November 30, 2007, and must have been written by a U.S. citizen.

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