On the 23rd of January 2025, the finalists for the 2024 National Book Critics Circle Award were announced. 

The National Book Critics Circle was founded in April 1974. With a mission to honor outstanding writing and foster a national conversation about reading, criticism, and literature, they currently serve nearly 800 member critics, authors, literary bloggers, book publishing professionals, student members, and friends. The National Book Critics Circle Award was created to award the finest books published in English in six categories: Fiction, Nonfiction, Biography, Autobiography, Poetry, and Criticism.

Below are the finalists for the 2024 US National Book Critics Circle Award:

Fiction

• Marie-Helene Bertino for Beautyland
• Joseph O’Neill for Godwin
• Percival Everett for James (James recently won the National Book Award for Fiction in 2024).
• Hisham Matar for My Friends
• Nora Lange for Us Fools

Nonfiction

• Steve Coll

  The Achilles Trap: Saddam Hussein, the C.I.A., and the Origins of America’s Invasion of Iraq

• Adam Higginbotham

  Challenger: A True Story of Heroism and Disaster on the Edge of Space

• Tricia Romano

  The Freaks Came Out To Write: The Definitive History of the Village Voice, the Radical Paper That Changed American Culture

• Gretchen Sisson

  Relinquished: The Politics of Adoption and the Privilege of American Motherhood

• Edwidge Danticat

  We’re Alone

Biography

• Jane Kamensky

  Candida Royalle and the Sexual Revolution: A History from Below

• Cynthia Carr

  Candy Darling: Dreamer, Icon, Superstar

• Jean Strouse

  Family Romance: John Singer Sargent and the Wertheimers

• Tiya Miles

  Night Flyer: Harriet Tubman and the Faith Dreams of a Free People

• Amy Reading

  The World She Edited: Katharine S. White at The New Yorker

Autobiography

• Manjula Martin

  The Last Fire Season: A Personal and Pyronatural History

• Wei Tchou

  Little Seed

• Zito Madu

  The Minotaur at Calle Lanza

• Erika Morillo

  Mother Archive: A Dominican Family Memoir

• Alexei Navalny, translation by Arch Tait with Stephen Dalziel

  Patriot: A Memoir

Poetry

• Jennifer Chang for An Authentic Life
• Oliver Baez Bendorf for Consider the Rooster
• Dawn Lundy Martin for Instructions for the Lovers
• Carl Phillips for Scattered Snows, to the North
• Anne Carson for Wrong Norma

Criticism

• Legacy Russell

  Black Meme: A History of the Images that Make Us

• Jesse McCarthy

  The Blue Period: Black Writing in the Early Cold War

• Claire Bishop

  Disordered Attention: How We Look at Art and Performance Today

• Marianne Brooker

  Intervals

• Hanif Abdurraqib

  There’s Always This Year: On Basketball and Ascension

The Winners will be announced on the 20th of March, 2025 at a ceremony in New York. Visit the National Book Critics Circle webpage for more information.