Welcome to bookchat where you can talk about anything...books, plays, essays, and books on tape. You don’t have to be reading a book to come in, sit down, and chat with us.
So many books are published in a year and so few of those that are not sensational are promoted as well as they might be. I know if I won an award, I would want people to hear about it so tonight I am listing the award winners for last year.
The lists also give us something new to peruse and good books to hopefully read. I recommend going to the listed sites because the book covers are wonderful and each synopsis is very interesting and helpful.
I know we won’t all agree with the books chosen so feel free to express your views on who should have won in the comments.
Nobel Prize for Literature
http://www.barnesandnoble.com/...
2009 Winner: Herta Müller
With an array of work portraying the difficulties of life in Romania during the brutal Ceausescu dictatorship, Herta Müller was selected as the winner of the 2009 Nobel Prize for Literature. Born into Romania's German minority, Müller started her luminous writing career -- sometimes penning works under clandestine conditions -- with a searing short story collection, Nadirs, and continued to publish essays, novels, and collections to critical acclaim. The Nobel Prize committee described Müller's work by noting that "with the concentration of poetry and the frankness of prose, [it] depicts the landscape of the dispossessed."
And because I missed this one:
2008 Winner: Jean-Marie Gustave Le Clézio
Desert by J. M. G. Le Clezio
Noted French author Jean-Marie Gustave Le Clézio took home the Nobel Prize in 2008, already having garnered the Prix Renaudot in 1963 for Proces-Verbal and the first Grand Prix Paul-Morand in 1980. With an eye toward ecological issues and Western thought -- but more recently childhood and travel -- Le Clézio has been hailed by such literary luminaries as Michel Foucault and was described by the Nobel committee as an "author of new departures, poetic adventure and sensual ecstasy, explorer of a humanity beyond and below the reigning civilization."
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Pulitzer Prize
http://www.barnesandnoble.com/...
Fiction
Olive Kitteridge by Elizabeth Strout
Claiming this year's Pulitzer Prize for Fiction is Elizabeth Strout's much-acclaimed Olive Kitteridge, a collection of 13 linked short stories centered around an outspoken and utterly unforgettable retired schoolteacher. Hailing Strout's accomplishment, The New Yorker observed that "[she] animates the ordinary with astonishing force."
Finalist: The Plague of Doves by Louise Erdrich
Finalist: All Souls by Christine Schutt
History
The Hemingses of Monticello by Annette Gordon-Reed
Already honored with the 2008 National Book Award for Nonfiction, The Hemingses of Monticello is Annette Gordon-Reed's fascinating story of an American slave family and their blood ties to Thomas Jefferson. Eschewing cynicism about the author of the Declaration of Independence, Gordon-Reed instead gives us the rich complexity of the Monticello clan.
Finalist: This Republic of Suffering: Death and the American Civil War by Drew Gilpin Faust
Finalist: The Liberal Hour: The 1960s and the Remaking of American Life by G. Calvin MacKenzie
Biography
American Lion by Jon Meacham
Jon Meacham, editor of Newsweek and the author of several bestselling political histories, takes the Pulitzer in Biography for his stunning portrait of Andrew Jackson, our seventh president, and his inner circle. At once venerated and reviled, Jackson was an orphan who fought his way to the pinnacle of power, founded the Democratic Party, and defined the presidency as we know it.
Finalist: Traitor to His Class: The Privileged Life and Radical Presidency of Franklin Delano Roosevelt by H. W. Brands
Finalist: The Bin Ladens: An Arabian Family in the American Century by Steve Coll
General Nonfiction
Slavery By Another Name by Douglas A. Blackmon
Doug Blackmon, The Wall Street Journal's Atlanta bureau chief, offers a startling exposé of the "age of neoslavery," the period between the Emancipation Proclamation and World War I in which freed slaves and their descendants were coerced back into involuntary servitude. Drawing on original documents and personal narratives, he brings to light atrocities long hidden from view.
Finalist: Gandhi & Churchill: The Epic Rivalry that Destroyed an Empire and Forged Our Age by Arthur Herman
Finalist: Bitter Road to Freedom: A New History of the Liberation of Europe by William I. Hitchcock
Poetry
The Shadow of Sirius by W. S. Merwin
The author of over 50 volumes of poetry, W. S. Merwin continues to illuminate the experience of being alive with this prizewinning collection of luminous poems about the power of memory, ranging from the recollection of a boyhood conversation to the precise quality of autumn light.
Finalist: Watching the Spring Festival by Frank Bidart
Finalist: What Love Comes To: New and Selected Poems by Ruth Stone
Drama
Ruined by Lynn Nottage
With a nod to Bertolt Brecht's Mother Courage, Lynn Nottage's searing drama about sexual violence in the war-torn Democratic Republic of Congo centers around Mama Nadi, a brothel keeper who strenuously avoids taking sides in the conflict, believing that her survival requires it. As Nottage powerfully suggests, not taking sides has moral consequences, too.
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Finalist: In the Heights by Lin-Manuel Miranda
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Children’s Book Awards
http://www.barnesandnoble.com/...
Newbery Medal
The Graveyard Book by Neil Gaiman
The John Newbery Medal goes to the author of the most distinguished American novel for children.
Honor Book: The Underneath by Kathi Appelt, David Small (Illustrator)
Honor Book: The Surrender Tree by Margarita Engle
Honor Book: Savvy by Ingrid Law
Honor Book: After Tupac and D Foster by Jacqueline Woodson
Caldecott Medal
The House in the Night by Susan Marie Swanson
The Randolph Caldecott Medal goes to the illustrator of the most distinguished American picture book for children.
Honor Book: A Couple of Boys Have the Best Week Ever by Marla Frazee
Honor Book: How I Learned Geography by Uri Shulevitz
Honor Book: A River of Words by Jen Bryant, Melissa Sweet (Illustrator)
C. Scott King Author Award
We Are the Ship by Kadir Nelson
The Coretta Scott King Author Award is presented to an author of African descent whose inspirational books best promote an appreciation of the American Dream.
Honor Book: Keeping the Night Watch by Hope Anita Smith, E. B. Lewis (Illustrator)
Honor Book: Blacker the Berry: Poems by Joyce Carol Thomas, Floyd Cooper (Illustrator)
Honor Book: Becoming Billie Holiday by Carole Boston Weatherford, Floyd Cooper (Illustrator)
C. Scott King Illustrator Award
The Blacker the Berry by Joyce Carol Thomas
The Coretta Scott King Illustrator Award is presented to an illustrator of African descent whose inspiring books best promote an understanding of the American Dream.
Honor Book: We Are the Ship: The Story of Negro League Baseball by Kadir Nelson, Kadir Nelson (Illustrator)
Honor Book: Before John Was a Jazz Giant: A Song of John Coltrane by Carole Boston Weatherford, Sean Qualls (Illustrator)
Honor Book: The Moon Over Star by Dianna Hutts Aston, Jerry Pinkney (Illustrator)
Michael L. Printz Award
Jellicoe Road by Melina Marchetta
This annual award is presented to the author of a book that best exemplifies literary excellence in young adult literature.
Honor Book: The Astonishing Life of Octavian Nothing, Traitor to the Nation, Volume II: The Kingdom on the Waves by M. T. Anderson.
Honor Book: The Disreputable History of Frankie Landau-Banks by E. Lockhart
Honor Book: Nation by Terry Pratchett
Honor Book: Tender Morsels by Margo Lanagan
Theodor Seuss Geisel Award
Are You Ready to Play Outside? (Elephant and Piggie Series) by Mo Willems
The Theodor Seuss Geisel Award honors the most outstanding book for beginning readers.
Honor Book: Chicken Said, "Cluck!"
Honor Book: One Boy
Honor Book: Stinky
Honor Book: Wolfsnail
Margaret A. Edwards Award
Speak by Laurie Halse Anderson
This award honors an author's lifetime achievement for writing books that consistently help adolescents better understand themselves and their world.
Also by Laurie Halse Anderson: Chains
Robert F. Sibert Award
We Are the Ship by Kadir Nelson
The Robert F. Sibert Informational Book Award goes to the most distinguished informational book for children.
Honor Book: Bodies from the Ice: Melting Glaciers and the Rediscovery of the Past by James M. Deem
Honor Book: What to Do about Alice?: How Alice Roosevelt Broke the Rules, Charmed the World, and Drove Her Father Teddy Crazy! by Barbara Kerley, Edwin Fotheringham (Illustrator)
Pura Belpré Awards
Just in Case by Yuyi Morales
The Pura Belpré Awards honor Latino illustrators and authors whose work best portrays, affirms, and celebrates the Latino cultural experience in children's books.
Winner of the Pura Belpré Author Award
The Surrender Tree by Margarita Engle
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Discover great New Writers Award
http://www.barnesandnoble.com/...
First Place, Fiction
The Well and the Mine by Gin Phillips
Set in 1930's Alabama, multiple narrators form a chorus to tell this story of the racial and class tensions that come bubbling to the surface when a young girl hears a big splash in her family's well." O, The Oprah Magazine praised Gin Phillips as "a dazzling new novelist," and called her first novel, "a quietly bold debut, full of heart."
First Place, Nonfiction
Beautiful Boy by David Sheff
Sheff's memoir, Entertainment Weekly's #1 nonfiction pick for 2008, and a #1 New York Times bestseller, is the harrowing story of a father who tries to wrest his teenage son from the horrors of drug addiction, and an unforgettable read.
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National Book Awards and nominees
http://www.barnesandnoble.com/...
2009 Fiction Winner:
Let the Great World Spin by Colum McCann
Lark and Termite by Jayne Phillips
In Other Rooms, Other Wonders by Daniyal Mueenuddin
Far North by Marcel Theroux
2009 Non-Fiction Winner
The First Tycoon by T. Stiles
2009 Poetry Winner
Transcendental Studies by Keith Waldrop
2009 Young People’s Literature Winner
Claudette Colvin by Phillip Hoose
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National Book Critics Circle Award
http://www.barnesandnoble.com/...
Fiction Winner
2666 by Roberto Bolano
Finalists
Home by Marilynne Robinson
The Lazarus Project by Aleksandar Hemon
The Ballad of Trenchmouth Taggart by M. Glenn Taylor
Olive Kitteridge by Elizabeth Strout
Nonfiction Winner
The Forever War by Dexter Filkins
Finalists
This Republic of Suffering: Death and the American Civil War by Drew Gilpin Faust
The Dark Side: The Inside Story of How the War on Terror Turned into a War on American Ideals by Jane Mayer
White Protestant Nation: The Rise of the American Conservative Movement by Allan J. Lichtman
From Colony to Superpower: U. S. Foreign Relations Since 1776 by George C. Herring
Autobiography Winner
My Father's Paradise by Ariel Sabar
Finalists
Why I Came West: A Memoir by Rick Bass
The Bishop's Daughter: A Memoir by Honor Moore
The Eaves of Heaven: A Life in Three Wars by Andrew X. Pham
The House at Sugar Beach: In Search of a Lost African Childhood by Helene Cooper
Biography Winner
The World Is What It Is by Patrick French
Finalists
Ida: A Sword Among Lions by Paula J. Giddings
The Bin Ladens: An Arabian Family in the American Century by Steve Coll
The Hemingses of Monticello: An American Family by Annette Gordon-Reed
White Heat: The Friendship of Emily Dickinson and Thomas Wentworth Higginson by Brenda Wineapple
Criticism Winner
Children's Literature by Seth Lerer
Finalists
The Men in My Life by Vivian Gornick
Maimonides: The Life and World of One of Civilization's Greatest Minds by Joel L. Kraemer
Orpheus in the Bronx: Essays on Identity, Politics, and the Freedom of Poetry by Reginald Shepherd
Everything Is Cinema: The Working Life of Jean-Luc Godard by Richard Brody
Poetry Winners
Sleeping It Off in Rapid City by August Kleinzahler
Co-Winner:
Half of the World in Light: New and Selected Poems by Juan Felipe Herrera
Finalists
Sources by Devin Johnston
Landscapist: Selected Poems by Pierre Martory
Human Dark with Sugar by Brenda Shaughnessy
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Edgar Allan Poe Awards
http://www.barnesandnoble.com/...
Best Novel
Blue Heaven by C. J. Box
Runners-up
Curse of the Spellmans (Spellman Files Series #2) by Lisa Lutz
Missing by Karin Alvtegen
The Night Following by Morag Joss
Price of Blood: An Irish Novel of Suspense by Declan Hughes
Sins of the Assassin by Robert Ferrigno
Best First Novel by an American Author
The Foreigner by Francie Lin
Runners-up
Calumet City by Charlie Newton
A Cure for Night by Justin Peacock
Kind One by Tom Epperson
Sweetsmoke by David Fuller
Best Paperback Original
China Lake by Meg Gardiner
Runners-up
The Cold Spot by Tom Piccirilli
Enemy Combatant by Ed Gaffney
Money Shot by Christa Faust
The Prince of Bagram Prison by Alex Carr
Best Critical/Biographical
Edgar Allan Poe by Harry Lee Poe
Runners-up
African American Mystery Writers: A Historical and Thematic Study by Frankie Y. Bailey
Hard-Boiled Sentimentality: The Secret History of American Crime Stories by Leonard Cassuto
The Rise of True Crime: 20th-Century Murder and American Popular Culture by Jean Murley
Scene of the Crime: The Importance of Place in Crime and Mystery Fiction by David Geherin
Best Fact Crime
American Lightning by Howard Blum
Runners-up
For the Thrill of It: Leopold, Loeb, and the Murder That Shocked Jazz Age Chicago by Simon Baatz
Havana Nocturne: How the Mob Owned Cuba and Then Lost it to the Revolution by T. J. English
Man Who Made Vermeers: Unvarnishing the Legend of Master Forger Han Van Meegeren by Jonathan Lopez
Suspicions of Mr. Whicher: A Shocking Murder and the Undoing of a Great Victorian Detective by Kate Summerscale
Best Young Adult
Paper Towns by John Green
Runners-up
Big Splash by Jack D. Ferraiolo
Bog Child by Siobhan Dowd
Getting the Girl: A Guide to Private Investigation, Surveillance, and Cookery by Susan Juby
Torn to Pieces by Margot McDonnell
Best Juvenile
Postcard by Tony Abbott
Runners-up
Cemetery Street by Brenda Seabrooke
Enigma: A Magical Mystery by Graeme Base
Eleven by Patricia Reilly Giff
The Witches of Dredmoore Hollow by Riford McKenzie
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The Agatha Awards
http://browse.barnesandnoble.com/...
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Bram Stoker Awards
http://browse.barnesandnoble.com/...
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List of winners and shortlisted authors of the Booker Prize for Fiction
http://en.wikipedia.org/...
Hilary Mantel Wolf Hall
A.S. Byatt The Children's Book
J.M. Coetzee Summertime
Adam Foulds The Quickening Maze
Simon Mawer The Glass Room
Sarah Waters The Little Stranger
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2008 Nebula and Andre Norton Award Winners
http://nebulaawards.com/
Best Novel: Powers by Ursula K. Le Guin
Best Novella: "The Spacetime Pool" by Catherine Asaro
Best Novelette: "Pride and Prometheus" by John Kessel
Best Short Story: "Trophy Wives" by Nina Kiriki Hoffman
Best Script: WALL-E Screenplay by Andrew Stanton, Jim Reardon, Original story by Andrew Stanton, Pete Docter
Andre Norton Award: Flora's Dare: How a Girl of Spirit Gambles All to Expand Her Vocabulary, Confront a Bouncing Boy Terror, and Try to Save Califa from a Shaky Doom (Despite Being Confined to Her Room) by Ysabeau S. Wilce
2009 Award Honorees
A. J. Budrys -- Solstice Award
M.J. Engh -- Author Emerita
Marty Greenberg -- Solstice Award
Harry Harrison -- Damon Knight Memorial Grand Master
Joss Whedon -- Ray Bradbury Award
Kate Wilhelm -- Solstice Award
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The Hugo Awards
http://www.thehugoawards.org/...
Best Novel: The Graveyard Book, Neil Gaiman (HarperCollins; Bloomsbury UK)
Best Novella: "The Erdmann Nexus", Nancy Kress (Asimov’s Oct/Nov 2008)
Best Novelette: "Shoggoths in Bloom", Elizabeth Bear (Asimov’s Mar 2008)
Best Short Story: "Exhalation", Ted Chiang (Eclipse Two)
Best Related Book: Your Hate Mail Will Be Graded: A Decade of Whatever, 1998-2008, John Scalzi (Subterranean Press)
Best Graphic Story: Girl Genius, Volume 8: Agatha Heterodyne and the Chapel of Bones, Written by Kaja & Phil Foglio, art by Phil Foglio, colors by Cheyenne Wright (Airship Entertainment)
Best Dramatic Presentation, Long Form: WALL-E Andrew Stanton & Pete Docter, story; Andrew Stanton & Jim Reardon, screenplay; Andrew Stanton, director (Pixar/Walt Disney)
Best Dramatic Presentation, Short Form: Doctor Horrible’s Sing-Along Blog, Joss Whedon, & Zack Whedon, & Jed Whedon, & Maurissa Tancharoen, writers; Joss Whedon, director (Mutant Enemy)
Best Editor Short Form: Ellen Datlow
Best Editor Long Form: David G. Hartwell
Best Professional Artist: Donato Giancola
Best Semiprozine: Weird Tales, edited by Ann VanderMeer & Stephen H. Segal
Best Fan Writer: Cheryl Morgan
Best Fanzine: Electric Velocipede edited by John Klima
Best Fan Artist: Frank Wu
And the John W. Campbell Award for Best New Writer (presented by Dell Magazines): David Anthony Durham
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LOCUS Awards
http://www.locusmag.com/...
Science Fiction Novel: Anathem, Neal Stephenson (Atlantic UK, Morrow)
Fantasy Novel: Lavinia, Ursula K. Le Guin (Harcourt)
First Novel: Singularity's Ring, Paul Melko (Tor)
Young-Adult Book: The Graveyard Book, Neil Gaiman (HarperCollins, Bloomsbury)
Novella: "Pretty Monsters", Kelly Link (Pretty Monsters)
Novelette: "Pump Six", Paolo Bacigalupi (Pump Six and Other Stories)
Short Story: "Exhalation", Ted Chiang (Eclipse Two)
Anthology: The Year's Best Science Fiction: Twenty-Fifth Annual Collection, Gardner Dozois, ed. (St. Martin's)
Collection: Pump Six and Other Stories, Paolo Bacigalupi (Night Shade Books)
Non-Fiction/Art Book: P. Craig Russell, Coraline: The Graphic Novel, Neil Gaiman, adapted and illustrated by P. Craig Russell (HarperCollins)
Editor: Ellen Datlow
Artist: Michael Whelan
Magazine: F&SF
Publisher: Tor
Is there a book that you think deserved a reward that did not get one this year?
Diaries of the week:
Write On! So you wanna write funny, honey?
by SensibleShoes
http://www.dailykos.com/...
"The Other Tibet" ------Xinjiang, China------- DKos Travel Board #24
by LaughingPlanet
http://www.dailykos.com/...
Let's read a book together: Ideas: A history of thought and invention from fire to Freud: Chap 2
by plf515
http://www.dailykos.com/...
NOTE: plf515 has changed his book talk to Wednesday mornings early.
sarahnity’s list of DKos authors has grown so much that she has her own diary.
http://www.dailykos.com/...
sarahnity says:
It turns out that we have quite a few authors hanging out here who have published books in the real world. A while ago, I started keeping a list of books by Kossacks, former Kossacks and Kossacks-once-removed. I was posting it each week to the diary series What Are You Reading and Bookflurries, but the list has grown long enough, that I've decided to turn it into a diary and post it as a weekly series on Tuesday evenings.
Not all Kossack authors may wish to lose their anonymity, so I am only including the author's UID if he has outed herself here (gender confusion intended). If you'd like to be included on the list, or if you know of an author who is left off, please leave a comment or email me.
(sarahnity@gmail.com)