2013 National Book Awards finalists announced

The finalists for the 2013 National Book Awards were announced Wednesday of last week.

Five finalists were announced in the fiction category. They were:

- “The Flamethowers” by Rachel Kushner

- “The Lowland” by Jhumpa Lahiri

- “The Good Lord Bird” by James McBride

- “Bleeding Edge” by Thomas Pynchon

- “Tenth of December” by George Saunders

Five finalists were also named in the nonfiction category. They included:

- “The Book of Ages: The Life and Opinions of Jane Fanklin” by Jill Lepore
- “Hitler’s Furies: German Women in the Nazi Killing Fields” by Wendy Lower
- “The Unwinding: An Inner History of the New America” by George Packer
- “The Internal Enemy: Slavery and War in Virginia, 1772-1832” by Alan Taylor
- “Going Clear: Scientology, Hollywood & the Prison of Belief” by Lawrence Wright

Finalists in the poetry category were:

- “Metaphysical Dog” by Frank Bidart
- “Stay, Illusion” by Lucie Brock-Broido
- “The Big Smoke” by Adrian Matejka
- “Black Aperture” by Matt Rasmussen
- “Incarnadine: Poems” by Mary Szybist

Five finalists were named in the young people’s literature category. They were:

- “The True Blue Scouts of Sugar Man Swamp” by Kathi Appelt
- “The Thing About Luck” by Cynthia Kadohata
- “Far Far Away” by Tom McNeal
- “Picture Me Gone” by Meg Rosoff
- “Boxers & Saints” by Gene Luen Yang

This year’s slate of winners will be announced on Nov. 20 at the 64th National Book Awards Benefit Dinner and Ceremony. Winners receive $10,000 and a bronze statue, and finalists receive $1,000 and a bronze medal.

Many of you will be familiar with some of the past National Book Award Winners, especially from the fiction category. Past NBA fiction winners include “From Here to Eternity” by James Jones, “Invisible Man” by Ralph Ellison, “The World According to Garp” by John Irving, “Rabbit is Rich” by John Updike, “The Color Purple” by Alice Walker, “All the Pretty Horses” by Cormac McCarthy and “Cold Mountain” by Charles Frazier.

For more information about the finalists mentioned above and past winners and finalists, visit www.nationalbook.org.

In the end, how many of the books mentioned above have you had the chance to read? Which did you like or dislike? Which would you recommend and why? Which books would you pick to win this year’s round of National Book Awards? Let us know in the comments section below.