2011 National Book Critics Circle Award Finalists Announced

January 21, 2012 | 6 books mentioned 2

The finalists for the annual National Book Critics Circle (NBCC) Award have been announced. The fiction list includes one of the biggest fiction releases of last year, but all five of the finalists got a fair amount of ink. No huge surprises. In fact, as we’ve noted in the past, the NBCC seems to do a better job of catching the zeitgeist than other major prizes like the National Book Award and the Booker, which like to play kingmaker by annointing less well known titles. Here are the finalists for fiction and non-fiction with excerpts and other links where available. As a side note, the NBCC award is particularly interesting in that it is one of the few major awards that pits American books against overseas (usually British) books.

Fiction

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Nonfiction

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For more on the NBCC Awards and the finalists in the other categories, visit the NBCC.

created The Millions and is its publisher. He and his family live in New Jersey.