National Books Critics Circle Awards Announces First-Ever Longlist for Fiction

The first-ever fiction longlist from the  National Book Critics Circle has finally arrived!

The NBCC recently announced that, in honor of its 50th anniversary, the organization would release longlists for their annual awards for the very first time. According to its website, the NBCC has been "honoring outstanding writing and fostering a national conversation about reading, criticism and literature since 1974."

Related: National Books Critics Circle Awards Announces First-Ever Longlist

From Dec. 16-Dec. 19, the board will reveal the longlists for six genres — fiction, autobiography, biography, nonfiction, poetry and criticism.

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“The NBCC is proud to release our longlists for the first time in our 50-year history,” said NBCC President Heather Scott Partington in the announcement. “Revealing them allows us to honor more writers, translators and books than we ever have in a single year. The best books of 2024 were narratives of resilience, interrogation and imagination. They asked us to question power, art and genre."

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She continued, "At a time when the freedom to read is under attack, we’re thrilled to shout these authors’ names from the rooftops. We celebrate their fearlessness and artistic vision. These are vital words.”

The Fiction genre longlist includes:

• The Anthropologists by Ayşegül Savaş

• Beautyland by Marie-Helene Bertino

• Colored Television by Danzy Senna

• Godwin by Joseph O’Neill

• Great Expectations by Vinson Cunningham

• James by Percival Everett

• My Friends by Hisham Matar

• Sister Deborah by Scholastique Mukasonga, translated from the French by Mark Polizzotti

• Small Rain by Garth Greenwell

• Us Fools by Nora Lange

Related: American Fiction Author Percival Everett Among Finalists for the Prestigious Booker Prize — See the Full List!

In addition to the NBCC genre awards, the members will also vote for winners of the John Leonard Prize for the best first book in any genre and the Gregg Barrios Book in Translation Prize, for the best book of any genre translated into English and published in the United States.

There are also awards that "recognize outstanding work by a member of the NBCC," as well as those that are given "to individuals and literary institutions for transformative contributions to book culture."

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The finalists for the 2024 publishing year will be announced on Jan. 23, 2025, and awards will be presented on March 20 — which will mark the 50th time the awards have been given.

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