The winners of the 2016 National Book Critics Circle Awards were announced on March 16, 2017 at the New School in New York.

Founded in 1974, the National Book Critics Circle Awards are given annually to honor outstanding writing and to foster a national conversation about reading, criticism and literature. The awards are open to any book published in the United States in English (including translations). The NBCC comprises nearly 700 critics and editors from leading newspapers and magazines providing coverage of books.

For more information about the National Book Critics Circle and the National Book Critics Circle Awards, go to http://bookcritics.org/.
 

2016 Winners

Autobiography
LAB GIRL by Hope Jahren (Alfred A. Knopf)

Biography
SHIRLEY JACKSON: A Rather Haunted Life by Ruth Franklin (Liveright)

Criticism
WHITE RAGE: The Unspoken Truth of Our Racial Divide by Carol Anderson (Bloomsbury)

Fiction
LaROSE by Louise Erdrich (Harper)

Nonfiction
EVICTED: Poverty and Profit in the American City by Matthew Desmond (Crown)

Poetry
HOUSE OF LORDS AND COMMONS by Ishion Hutchinson (Farrar, Straus, and Giroux)

John Leonard Prize
HOMEGOING by Yaa Gyasi (Alfred A. Knopf)

Nona Balakian Citation for Excellence in Reviewing
Michelle Dean

Ivan Sandrof Lifetime Achievement Award
Margaret Atwood

2016 Finalists

Autobiography

• THE ICEBERG by Marion Coutts (Black Cat Press)
• IN GRATITUDE by Jenny Diski (Bloomsbury)
• LAB GIRL by Hope Jahren (Alfred A. Knopf)
• THE RETURN: Fathers, Sons, and the Land in Between by Hisham Matar (Random House)
• THE SONG POET: A Memoir of My Father by Kao Kalia Yang (Metropolitan Books)

Biography

• MOSCOW NIGHTS: The Van Cliburn Story by Nigel Cliff (Harper)
• SHIRLEY JACKSON: A Rather Haunted Life by Ruth Franklin (Liveright)
• BLACK ELK: The Life of an American Visionary by Joe Jackson (Farrar, Straus and Giroux)
• KRAZY: George Herriman, a Life in Black and White by Michael Tisserand (Harper)
• GUILTY THING: A Life of Thomas De Quincey by Frances Wilson (Farrar, Straus and Giroux)

Criticism

• WHITE RAGE: The Unspoken Truth of Our Racial Divide by Carol Anderson (Bloomsbury)
• AGAINST EVERYTHING: Essays by Mark Greif (Pantheon)
• LOOKING FOR THE STRANGER: Albert Camus and the Life of a Literary Classic by Alice Kaplan (University of Chicago Press)
• THE LONELY CITY: Adventures in the Art of Being Alone by Olivia Laing (Picador)
• AM I ALONE HERE?: Notes on Living to Read and Reading to Live by Peter Orner (Catapult)

Fiction

• MOONGLOW by Michael Chabon (Harper)
• LaROSE by Louise Erdrich (Harper)
• IMAGINE ME GONE by Adam Haslett (Little, Brown)
• COMMONWEALTH by Ann Patchett (Harper)
• SWING TIME by Zadie Smith (Penguin Press)

Nonfiction

• EVICTED: Poverty and Profit in the American City by Matthew Desmond (Crown)
• STAMPED FROM THE BEGINNING: The Definitive History of Racist Ideas in America by Ibram X. Kendi (Nation Books)
• DARK MONEY: The Hidden History of the Billionaires Behind the Rise of the Radical Right by Jane Mayer (Doubleday)
• NOTHING EVER DIES: Vietnam and the Memory of War by Viet Thanh Nguyen (Harvard University Press)
• WRITING TO SAVE A LIFE: The Louis Till File by John Edgar Wideman (Scribner)

Poetry

• HOUSE OF LORDS AND COMMONS by Ishion Hutchinson (Farrar, Straus, and Giroux)
• OLIO by Tyehimba Jess (Wave Books)
• WORKS AND DAYS by Bernadette Mayer (New Directions)
• AT THE FOUNDLING HOSPITAL by Robert Pinsky (Farrar, Straus and Giroux)
• BLACKACRE by Monica Youn (Graywolf Press)

John Leonard Prize

• HOMEGOING by Yaa Gyasi (Alfred A. Knopf)

Nona Balakian Citation for Excellence in Reviewing

• Michelle Dean

Ivan Sandrof Lifetime Achievement Award

• Margaret Atwood