The winners of the 73rd National Book Awards will be announced on November 16.
I explored the National Book Foundation website both as a source for developing the library’s collection and as a point of personal curiosity. The National Book Foundation is probably best known for the annual National Book Awards, but it also runs a program called BookUp that connects students with local authors, organizes free book groups, and distributes free books to students. Additionally, the Foundation hosts an annual National Book Awards Teen Press Conference in New York City, which invites young readers to meet and interview authors. I was thrilled to learn more about these programs and to know that the National Book Foundation is committed to the development and growth of lifelong readers.
If you want to learn more about the National Book Foundation, I encourage everyone to visit www.nationalbook.org. I was particularly struck by the Foundation’s statement of values which is guided by the following core beliefs:
- Books are essential to a thriving cultural landscape
- Books and literature provide a depth of engagement that helps protect, stimulate and promote discourse
- Books and literature are for everyone, everywhere.
The last point – books and literature are for everyone, everywhere – is also one of my fundamental beliefs as a librarian and reader. I also appreciate how it echoes the second and third laws of SR Ranganathan’s Five Laws of Librarianship: 2) Each person’s book 3) Each book’s reader.
Winning a National Book Award must be incredibly rewarding, but I have to imagine being nominated is equally exciting and rewarding for any author. In honor of the upcoming awards show, I recommend reading one — or all — of the 2022 nonfiction nominees.
- “The Invisible Kingdom: Reinventing Chronic Disease” by Meghan O’Rourke. (available in paper format, eBook and eAudiobook)
- “From the South to America: A Journey Under the Mason-Dixon to Understand the Soul of a Nation” by Imani Perry. (available in paper format, eBook and eAudiobook)
- “Out of Breath: The Scientific Race to Defeat a Deadly Virus” by David Quammen. (available in print)
- “The Man Who Could Move the Clouds: Memoirs” by Ingrid Rojas Contreras. (available in paper and eBook format)
- “His Name is George Floyd: One Man’s Life and the Fight for Racial Injustice” by Robert Samuels and Toluse Olorunnipa. (available in print, large print and eBook)
