In a Queue for a Recent Award Winner? Read These While You Wait
Do you look forward to book awards season as much as we do? Every year in the fall, awards committees, organizations, and publications present their assessments of the best books of the year. And all too frequently, after that there is a scrabble among booksellers, librarians, and readers to get their hands on copies of the favored books. So, after you add your name to the holds queue for the National Book Award and Booker Prize winners, here are some recommendations to keep you sated while you wait.
If you're waiting for Interior Chinatown by Charles Yu, check out these:
The Majesties by Tiffany Tsao—A Chinese-Indonesian family saga that centers on an unspeakable act of violence and the history, both individual and cultural, that leads up to it.
The Starlet and the Spyby Ji-Min Lee—A dazzling work of historical fiction, based on true events, about two women who seem the most unlikely to ever meet: Alice, a Korean war survivor and translator for the American forces in Seoul and Marilyn Monroe, who is visiting Korea on a four-day USO tour.
Tigermanby Nick Harkaway—Assigned to a ceremonial post in Mancreu, British consul and Afghanistan war veteran Lester Ferris is compelled to disregard widespread underworld activities while bonding with a comic-addicted youth who relies on him for help during a violent uprising.
Searching for Sylvie Lee by Jean Kwok—Three women from a Chinese immigrant family navigate complicated secrets when an elder daughter goes missing while visiting her dying grandmother in the Netherlands.
Hold Fast Your Crown by Yannick Haenel—An exasperated writer obsessed with American cinema embarks on an increasingly bizarre journey in this heady, engrossing novel that bridges the divide between literature and cinema.
If you're waiting for The Dead Are Arising: A Life of Malcolm X by Les Payne and Tamara Payne:
The Autobiography of Malcolm Xas told to Alex Haley—This classic presents Malcolm X's political philosophy and his fascinating perspective on the lies and limitations of the American Dream, and the inherent racism in a society that denies its nonwhite citizens the opportunity to dream, offering insight into the most urgent issues of our own time.
X : A Novelby Ilyasah Shabazz—This novel follows the boy who would become Malcolm X from his childhood to his imprisonment for theft at age twenty, when he found the faith that would lead him to forge a new path and command a voice that still resonates today.
Strivers Row by Kevin Baker—Rev. Jonah Dove returns home to World War II-era Harlem, troubled by his history of passing as a white man in college and by the bleak prospects for his people in a racist America, and finds his life colliding with that of Malcolm Little, who would eventually rename himself Malcolm X.
When They Call You A Terrorist by Patrisse Khan-Cullors—A lyrical memoir by a co-founder of the Black Lives Matter movement explains the movement's position of love, humanity, and justice, challenging perspectives that have negatively labeled the movement's activists while calling for essential political changes.
The Beautiful Struggle by Ta-Nehisi Coates—A memoir of growing up in the tough world of Baltimore in the 1980s chronicles the relationship between the author and his father, a Vietnam vet and Black Panther affiliate, and his campaign to keep his sons from falling victim to the temptations of the streets.
If you're waiting for DMZ by Don Lee Choi:
Cell Block Five by Fadhil al-Azzawi—Written in 1971 and published outside Iraq in 1972, this Iraqi prison novel draws the reader subtly into the world of both political prisoners and guards. The author is a poet and former political prisoner himself.
The Visiting Suit: Stories from my Prison Life by Xiaoda Xiao—Xiao spent five years in a prison labor camp in China, and these stories focus equally on his fellow inmates (a local theater director, a veterinarian, a university professor), and capture their mutual everyday struggle to survive their sentences with dignity intact.
Felon by Reginald Dwayne Betts—Poems that tell the story of "the visceral effect that prison has on identity" -- canvassing a wide range of emotions and experiences through homelessness, underemployment, love, drug abuse, domestic violence, fatherhood, and grace.
Koreaby Simon Winchester—Describes the history, culture, and geography of Korea and shares the author's experiences exploring the major cities and countryside.
If you're waiting for Tokyo Ueno Station by Yu Miri:
A Tale for the Time Being by Ruth Ozeki—A novelist on a remote island in the Pacific is linked to a bullied and depressed Tokyo teenager after discovering a Hello Kitty lunchbox that washed ashore.
Hotel Worldby Ali Smith—Five people: four are living; three are strangers; two are sisters; one, a teenage hotel chambermaid, has fallen to her death in a dumbwaiter. One night all five women find themselves in the smooth plush environs of the Global Hotel, where their very different fates will intersect.
After the Quake by Haruki Murakami—A collection of stories inspired by the January 1995 Kobe earthquake and the poison gas subway attacks two months later follows the experiences of people who found their normal lives undone by surreal events.
Human Acts by Han Kang—This novel follows the aftermath of a young boy's shocking death during a violent student uprising as told from the perspectives of the event's victims and their loved ones.
If you're waiting for King and the Dragonflies by Kacen Callender:
The Stars and the Blackness Between Them by Junauda Petrus—Told in two voices, sixteen-year-old Audre and Mabel, both young women of color, one from Trinidad and one from Minneapolis, fall in love and figure out how to care for each other as one of them faces a fatal illness.
The Ethan I Was Before by Ali Standish—Moving from Boston to small-town Georgia after losing his best friend in a devastating accident, Ethan bonds with Coralee, a girl with an outsized personality whose inclination toward colorful stories may be putting both of them in danger.
Ghost by Jason Reynolds—Aspiring to be the fastest sprinter on his elite middle school's track team, gifted runner Ghost finds his goal challenged by a tragic past with a violent father.
Far From the Treeby Robin Benway—Feeling incomplete as an adopted child after placing her own baby up for adoption, teen Grace tracks down her biological siblings and finds herself struggling with the dynamics of being a middle child between an embittered older brother and an outspoken younger sister.
If you're waiting for Booker Prize winner Shuggie Bain by Douglas Stuart:
A Girl is a Half-Formed Thing by Eimear McBride—A young woman details the story of her brother, his childhood brain tumor, and how his ailment cast a shadow over both their childhoods.
Imagine Me Gone by Adam Haslett—Electing to marry her fiance after he is hospitalized for depression, Margaret commits to decades of love and faith involving their brilliant eldest son, their responsible daughter, and a tightly controlled younger son who help her care for her increasingly troubled husband.
Shadow Tag by Louise Erdrich—After she discovers that her husband has been reading her diary, Irene America turns it into a manipulative farce, while secretly keeping a second diary that includes her true thoughts about her shaky marriage, its effect on her children, and her struggles with alcohol.
Alphabet by Kathy Page—Serving a life sentence for his girlfriend's murder, Simon Austen begins an experimental therapy program in prison that forces him to confront his most serious issues on his road to rehabilitation.
Animalia by Jean-Baptiste Del Amo—Enduring a hardscrabble childhood on her family's farm in southwest France, a woman becomes the matriarch of a large industrial pig farm, where the casual brutality inflicted on animals reflects the horrors of the 20th century's wars and diseases.
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Staff picks are chosen by NYPL staff members and are not intended to be comprehensive lists. We'd love to hear your ideas too, so leave a comment and tell us what you’d recommend. And check out our Staff Picks browse tool for more recommendations!