Register for the 2024 National Book Awards Finalist Reading

Each year, the Finalists in Fiction, Nonfiction, Poetry, Translated Literature, and Young People’s Literature gather the evening before the National Book Awards Ceremony to read excerpts from their honored works. To learn more about the 2024 National Book Awards Finalists, click here.

The 2024 National Book Awards Finalist Reading will be hosted by Brittany Luse, award–winning journalist, on-air host and cultural critic, and the host of It’s Been a Minute from NPR.

The event will be presented in person at NYU Skirball and livestreamed. Purchase tickets here on NYU Skirball’s website. If you’re unable to attend in person, please register for the livestream on the National Book Foundation’s website.

Doors will open at 6:30pm, and the program will begin at 7:00pm EST.

Presented in partnership with the NYU Creative Writing Program.

FICTION FINALISTS

‘Pemi Aguda, Ghostroots
Kaveh Akbar, Martyr!
Percival Everett, James
Miranda July, All Fours
Hisham Matar, My Friends

NONFICTION FINALISTS

Jason De León, Soldiers and Kings: Survival and Hope in the World of Human Smuggling
Eliza Griswold, Circle of Hope: A Reckoning with Love, Power, and Justice in an American Church
Kate Manne, Unshrinking: How to Face Fatphobia
Salman Rushdie, Knife: Meditations After an Attempted Murder
Deborah Jackson Taffa, Whiskey Tender

POETRY FINALISTS

Anne Carson, Wrong Norma
Fady Joudah, […]
m.s. RedCherries, mother
Diane Seuss, Modern Poetry
Lena Khalaf Tuffaha, Something About Living

TRANSLATED LITERATURE FINALISTS

Bothayna Al-Essa, and translators Ranya Abdelrahman and Sawad Hussain, The Book Censor’s Library
Linnea Axelsson and translator Saskia Vogel, Ædnan
Fiston Mwanza Mujila, and translator Roland Glasser, The Villain’s Dance
Yáng Shuāng-zǐ and translator Lin King, Taiwan Travelogue
Samar Yazbek and translator Leri Price, Where the Wind Calls Home

YOUNG PEOPLE’S LITERATURE FINALISTS

Violet Duncan, Buffalo Dreamer
Josh Galarza, The Great Cool Ranch Dorito in the Sky
Erin Entrada Kelly, The First State of Being
Shifa Saltagi Safadi, Kareem Between
Angela Shanté, The Unboxing of a Black Girl

(Finalists will not appear in this order)

HOSTED BY BRITTANY LUSE

Brittany Luse is an award–winning journalist, on-air host, and cultural critic. She is currently the host of It’s Been a Minute, a podcast and nationally syndicated radio show from NPR. Previously, Luse hosted For Colored Nerds, The Nod, and Sampler podcasts, and co-hosted and executive produced The Nod with Brittany and Eric, a daily streaming show. She’s written for Vulture and Harper’s Bazaar, among others, and edited for the podcasts Planet Money and Not Past It. Luse and her work have been profiled by publications like the New York Times, The New Yorker and Teen Vogue.