Friday, October 24, 2008

National Book Awards 2008

Some how between being there and getting back here, I managed to miss announcing the shortlist for the National Book award.

Winners will be announced on November 19th. Here are the finalists in fiction :

Aleksandar Hemon - The Lazarus Project
Rachel Kushner - Telex from Cuba
Peter Matthiessen - Shadow Country
Marilynne Robinson - Home
Salvatore Scibona - The End

You can watch the video of the 2008 National Book Awards Announcement in all categories here.

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

Thank you for highlighting one of the most important book awards in the world. However, I have to admit that the finalists are rather "underdogs", with the exception of "Home" and "Shadow Country" (which is the combined trilogy of Matthiessen's "Killing Mister Watson", "Lost Man's River" and "Bone by Bone" (and at 912 pages, this is what I don't need in my super hectic life). I feel that "Home" is the front runner. Am in the midst of it.

By the way, I DIG "The White Tiger"! Now I'm ready to pick another India-themed novel again. I stopped lingering with anything India (the country) 7 years ago after reading "A Fine Balance", as it is soooooooooooooooooo depressing. I'm planning to get Vassanji's latest (Assassin something....) soon. Plenty of book vouchers to be spent thanks to my birthday last week :-)