2007 NBA Shortlist Bound to Invite Controversy

The shortlists for the 2007 National Book Awards were announced today and include at least one title bound to bring the competition more press coverage than usual.

Within an hour of the announcement that Christopher Hitchens’ controversial bestseller God Is Not Great: How Religion Poisons Everything had been nominated in the non-fiction category, news agencies started filing stories that featured Hitchens’ inclusion. “Anti-religion book a nominee for National Book Awards,” CBC News told its readers.

Overall, the 2007 shortlist seems to represent a larger than usual percentage of books that many readers will find accessible: and might even find on their shelves including Time and Materials, former US Poet Laureate Robert Hass’ first collection in 10 years; The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian by Sherman Alexie; Jim Shepard’s collection of stories, Like You’d Understand, Anyway; Edwidge Danticat’s memoir, Brother, I'm Dying; Arnold Rampersad’s biography of Ralph Ellison and Legacy of Ashes, Tim Weiner’s history of the CIA.

2007’s very tough field will be narrowed down on November 14th at a benefit dinner and ceremony in Manhattan to be hosted by writer, humorist and best dressed list hall of famer Fran Lebowitz. The winner in each category will receive $10,000 plus a bronze
statue while each finalist has received a bronze medal and a $1,000 cash award. That evening Joan Didion and Terry Gross will receive special awards: Didion will receive the Medal for Distinguished Contribution to American Letters and Gross for Outstanding Service to the American Literary Community.

There are several events planned leading up to the festivities on November 14th. You can read about them here.

Here’s the full list of finalists for the 2007 National Book Awards:

Fiction:
Fieldwork, by Mischa Berlinski (Farrar, Straus & Giroux)
Varieties of Disturbance, by Lydia Davis (Farrar, Straus & Giroux)
Then We Came to the End, by Joshua Ferris (Little, Brown & Company)
Tree of Smoke, by Denis Johnson (Farrar, Straus & Giroux)
Like You’d Understand, Anyway, by Jim Shepard (Alfred A. Knopf)

Nonfiction:
Brother, I’m Dying, by Edwidge Danticat (Alfred A. Knopf)
God Is Not Great: How Religion Poisons Everything, by Christopher Hitchens (Twelve/Hachette Book Group USA)
Unruly Americans and the Origins of the Constitution, by Woody Holton (Hill and Wang/Farrar, Straus and Giroux)
Ralph Ellison: A Biography, by Arnold Rampersad (Alfred A. Knopf)
Legacy of Ashes: The History of the CIA, by Tim Weiner (Doubleday)

Poetry:
Magnetic North, by Linda Gregerson (Houghton Mifflin Company)
Time and Materials, by Robert Hass (Ecco/HarperCollins)
The House on Boulevard St., by David Kirby (Louisiana State University Press)
Old Heart, by Stanley Plumly (W.W. Norton & Company)
Messenger, by Ellen Bryant Voigt (W.W. Norton & Company)

Young People’s Literature:
The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian, by Sherman Alexie (Little, Brown & Company)
Skin Hunger: A Resurrection of Magic, Book One, by Kathleen Duey (Atheneum Books for Young Readers)
Touching Snow, by M. Sindy Felin (Atheneum Books for Young Readers)
The Invention of Hugo Cabret, by Brian Selznick (Scholastic Press)
Story of a Girl, by Sara Zarr (Little, Brown & Company)