{"id":10708,"date":"2014-01-13T14:18:00","date_gmt":"2014-01-13T18:18:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/mookseandgripes.com\/reviews\/?p=10708"},"modified":"2014-01-14T14:22:16","modified_gmt":"2014-01-14T18:22:16","slug":"national-book-critics-circle-finalists","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/mookseandgripes.com\/reviews\/2014\/01\/13\/national-book-critics-circle-finalists\/","title":{"rendered":"National Book Critics Circle Finalists"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Today the NBCC announced their finalists.<\/p>\n<p><span style=\"text-decoration: underline;\"><strong>Fiction:<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n<ul>\n<li><em><strong>Americanah<\/strong><\/em>, by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie<\/li>\n<li><em><strong>Someone<\/strong><\/em>, by Alice McDermott<\/li>\n<li><em><strong>The Infatuations<\/strong><\/em>, by Javier Mar\u00edas (my review <a href=\"http:\/\/mookseandgripes.com\/reviews\/2013\/09\/13\/javier-marias-the-infatuations\/\" target=\"_blank\">here<\/a>)<\/li>\n<li><em><strong>A Tale for the Time Bei<\/strong><\/em>ng, by Ruth Ozeki<\/li>\n<li><em><strong>The Goldfinch<\/strong><\/em>, by Donna Tartt<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p><span style=\"text-decoration: underline;\"><strong>Nonfiction:<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n<ul>\n<li><em><strong>Whitey Bulger: America&#8217;s Most Wanted Gangster and the Manhunt that Brought Him to Justice<\/strong><\/em>, by Kevin Cullen and Shelley Murphy<\/li>\n<li><em><strong>Five Days at Memorial: Life and Death in a Storm-Ravaged Hospital<\/strong><\/em>, by Sherri Fink<\/li>\n<li><em><strong>Thank You for Your Service<\/strong><\/em>, by David Finkel<\/li>\n<li><em><strong>The Unwinding: An Inner History of the New America<\/strong><\/em>, by George Packer<\/li>\n<li><em><strong>Going Clear: Scientology, Hollywood and the Prison of Belief<\/strong><\/em>, by Lawrence Wright<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p><strong><span style=\"text-decoration: underline;\">Poetry:<\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n<ul>\n<li><em><strong>Metaphysical Dog<\/strong><\/em>, by Frank Bidart<\/li>\n<li><em><strong>Stay, Illusion<\/strong><\/em>, by Lucie Brock-Broido<\/li>\n<li><em><strong>Blowout<\/strong><\/em>, by Denise Duhamel<\/li>\n<li><em><strong>Elegy Owed<\/strong><\/em>, by Bob Hicok<\/li>\n<li><em><strong>Milk and Filth<\/strong><\/em>, by Carmen Gimenez Smith<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p><span style=\"text-decoration: underline;\"><strong>Autobiography:<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n<ul>\n<li><em><strong>Wave<\/strong><\/em>, by Sonali Deraniyagala<\/li>\n<li><em><strong>The Book of My Lives<\/strong><\/em>, by Aleksandar Hemon<\/li>\n<li><em><strong>The Faraway Nearby<\/strong><\/em>, by Rebecca Solnit<\/li>\n<li><em><strong>Men We Reaped<\/strong><\/em>, by Jesmyn Ward<\/li>\n<li><em><strong>Farewell, Fred Voodoo: A Letter\u00a0from Haiti<\/strong><\/em>, by Amy Wilentz<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p><span style=\"text-decoration: underline;\"><strong>Biography:<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n<ul>\n<li><em><strong>Lawrence in Arabia: War, Deceit, Imperial Folly and the Making of the Modern Middle East<\/strong><\/em>, by Scott Anderson<\/li>\n<li><em><strong>Jonathan Swift: His Life and His World<\/strong><\/em>, by Leo Damrosch<\/li>\n<li><strong><em>Bach: Music in the Castles of Heaven<\/em><\/strong>, by John Eliot Gardiner<\/li>\n<li><em><strong>Holding on Upside Down: The Life and Works of Marianne Moore<\/strong><\/em>, by Linda Leavell<\/li>\n<li><em><strong>Birth Certificate: The Story of Danilo Kis<\/strong><\/em>, by Mark Thompson<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p><span style=\"text-decoration: underline;\"><strong>Criticism:<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n<ul>\n<li><em><strong>White Girls<\/strong><\/em>, by Hilton Als<\/li>\n<li><em><strong>Confronting the Classics: Traditions, Adventures and Innovations<\/strong><\/em>, by Mary Beard<\/li>\n<li><em><strong>The Kraus Project: Essays by Karl Kraus<\/strong><\/em>, translated and annotated by Jonathan Franzen with Paul Reiter and Daniel Kehlmann<\/li>\n<li><em><strong>Forty-One False Starts: Essays on Artists and Writers<\/strong><\/em>, by Janet Malcolm<\/li>\n<li><em><strong>Distant Reading<\/strong><\/em>, by Franco Moretti<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>-The Ivan Sandrof Lifetime Achievement Award went to 84-year-old Rolando Hinojosa-Smith.<\/p>\n<p>-The John Leonard Prize went to <em><strong>A Constellation of Vital Phenomena<\/strong><\/em><strong><\/strong>, by Anthony Marra. This prize was set up this year to &#8220;recognize outstanding first books in any genre.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>-The Nona Balakian Citation for Excellence in Reviewing went to Katherine A. Powers. Finalists were Ruth Franklin, James Marcus, Roxana Robinson, and Alexandra Schwartz.<\/p>\n<p>A few random thoughts:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>I began Donna Tartt&#8217;s <em>The Goldfinch<\/em> last week. I&#8217;m not far, but she is proving to be an exceptional writer. I&#8217;m excited to keep going here, but don&#8217;t expect a review too soon &#8212; the book is over 700 pages long!<\/li>\n<li>I have also read most of Aleksandar Hemon&#8217;s <em>The Book of My Lives<\/em>, and I can confidently recommend it.<\/li>\n<li>I think the John Leonard Prize is interesting and it&#8217;s always nice to recognize debut works, but I also think it&#8217;s a bit weird the book was awarded there and is not a finalist in the fiction category. Do we really need a new award that recognizes debuts that didn&#8217;t become finalists in their own right?<\/li>\n<li>I love to read Katherine A. Powers&#8217; frequent reviews at the B&amp;N Review. You can find an index of them <a href=\"http:\/\/bnreview.barnesandnoble.com\/t5\/custom\/page\/page-id\/contributor\/user-id\/70\" target=\"_blank\">here<\/a>.<\/li>\n<li>I cannot wait to get my hands on Mary Beard&#8217;s <em>Confronting the Classics<\/em>. I know nothing about this book, but Mary Beard is Mary Beard and it&#8217;s just going to be worth reading.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Today the NBCC announced their finalists. Fiction: Americanah, by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie Someone, by Alice McDermott The Infatuations, by Javier Mar\u00edas (my review here) A Tale for the Time Being, by Ruth Ozeki The Goldfinch, by Donna Tartt Nonfiction: Whitey Bulger: America&#8217;s Most Wanted Gangster and the Manhunt that Brought Him to Justice, by Kevin Cullen [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"libsyn-item-id":0,"libsyn-show-id":0,"libsyn-post-error":"","libsyn-post-error_post-type":"","libsyn-post-error_post-permissions":"","libsyn-post-error_api":"","playlist-podcast-url":"","libsyn-episode-thumbnail":"","libsyn-episode-widescreen_image":"","libsyn-episode-blog_image":"","libsyn-episode-background_image":"","libsyn-post-episode-category-selection":"","libsyn-post-episode-player_use_thumbnail":"","libsyn-post-episode-player_use_theme":"","libsyn-post-episode-player_height":"","libsyn-post-episode-player_width":"","libsyn-post-episode-player_placement":"","libsyn-post-episode-player_use_download_link":"","libsyn-post-episode-player_use_download_link_text":"","libsyn-post-episode-player_custom_color":"","libsyn-post-episode-itunes-explicit":"","libsyn-post-episode":"","libsyn-post-episode-update-id3":"","libsyn-post-episode-release-date":"","libsyn-post-episode-simple-download":"","libsyn-release-date":"","libsyn-post-update-release-date":"","libsyn-is_draft":"","libsyn-new-media-media":"","libsyn-post-episode-subtitle":"","libsyn-new-media-image":"","libsyn-post-episode-keywords":"","libsyn-post-itunes":"","libsyn-post-episode-itunes-episode-number":"","libsyn-post-episode-itunes-season-number":"","libsyn-post-episode-itunes-episode-type":"","libsyn-post-episode-itunes-episode-title":"","libsyn-post-episode-itunes-episode-author":"","libsyn-destination-releases":"","libsyn-post-episode-advanced-destination-form-data":"","libsyn-post-episode-advanced-destination-form-data-enabled":"","libsyn-post-episode-advanced-destination-form-data-input-enabled":false,"libsyn-post-episode-premium_state":"","libsyn-episode-shortcode":"","libsyn-episode-embedurl":"","_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"coauthors":[],"class_list":["post-10708","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/pqqvZ-2MI","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_likes_enabled":false,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/mookseandgripes.com\/reviews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10708","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/mookseandgripes.com\/reviews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/mookseandgripes.com\/reviews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mookseandgripes.com\/reviews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mookseandgripes.com\/reviews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=10708"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/mookseandgripes.com\/reviews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10708\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":10712,"href":"https:\/\/mookseandgripes.com\/reviews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10708\/revisions\/10712"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/mookseandgripes.com\/reviews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=10708"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mookseandgripes.com\/reviews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=10708"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mookseandgripes.com\/reviews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=10708"},{"taxonomy":"author","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mookseandgripes.com\/reviews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/coauthors?post=10708"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}