The winners of the 2020 National Book Critics Circle Awards were announced on March 25th during an online ceremony.

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 more than 750 critics and editors from leading newspapers, magazines and online publications.

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

2020 Winners

Autobiography
MINOR FEELINGS: An Asian American Reckoning, by Cathy Park Hong (One World)

Biography
STRANGER IN THE SHOGUN'S CITY: A Japanese Woman and Her World, by Amy Stanley (Scribner)

Criticism
MARKING TIME: Art in the Age of Mass Incarceration, by Nicole Fleetwood (Harvard University Press)

Fiction
HAMNET: A Novel of the Plague, by Maggie O’Farrell (Knopf)

Nonfiction
ISLAND ON FIRE: The Revolt That Ended Slavery in the British Empire, by Tom Zoellner (Harvard University Press)

Poetry
HERE IS THE SWEET HAND: Poems, by Francine J. Harris (Farrar, Straus and Giroux)

The John Leonard Award for Best First Book
LUSTER by Raven Leilani (Farrar, Straus and Giroux)

The Nona Balakian Citation for Excellence in Reviewing
Jo Livingstone

The Ivan Sandrof Award for Lifetime Achievement
The Feminist Press at the City University of New York

2020 Finalists

Autobiography

• MINOR FEELINGS: An Asian American Reckoning, by Cathy Park Hong (One World)
• THIS IS MAJOR: Notes on Diana Ross, Dark Girls, and Being Dope, by Shayla Lawson (Harper Perennial)
• GOLEM GIRL: A Memoir, by Riva Lehrer (One World)
• THE DRAGONS, THE GIANT, THE WOMEN: A Memoir, by Wayétu Moore (Graywolf Press)
• HOME BAKED: My Mom, Marijuana, and the Stoning of San Francisco, by Alia Volz (Houghton Mifflin Harcourt)

Biography

• STRANGER IN THE SHOGUN'S CITY: A Japanese Woman and Her World, by Amy Stanley (Scribner)
• THE PRICE OF PEACE: Money, Democracy, and the Life of John Maynard Keynes, by Zachary D. Carter (Random House)
• RED COMET: The Short Life and Blazing Art of Sylvia Plath, by Heather Clark (Knopf)
• THE DEAD ARE ARISING: The Life of Malcolm X, by Les Payne and Tamara Payne (Liveright)
• THE EQUIVALENTS: A Story of Art, Female Friendship, and Liberation in the 1960s, by Maggie Doherty (Knopf)

Criticism

• MARKING TIME: Art in the Age of Mass Incarceration, by Nicole Fleetwood (Harvard University Press)
• STRANGER FACES by Namwali Serpell (Transit Books)
• GRIEVING: Dispatches from a Wounded Country, by Cristina Rivera Garza (Feminist Press)
• UNFINISHED BUSINESS: Notes of a Chronic Re-Reader, by Vivian Gornick (Farrar, Straus and Giroux)
• CRAP: A History of Cheap Stuff in America, by Wendy A. Woloson (University of Chicago Press)

Fiction

• INSIDE STORY by Martin Amis (Knopf)
• IF I HAD TWO WINGS: Stories, by Randall Kenan (W. W. Norton & Company)
• HAMNET: A Novel of the Plague, by Maggie O’Farrell (Knopf)
• HOW TO PRONOUNCE KNIFE: Stories, by Souvankham Thammavongsa (Little, Brown and Company)
• MEMORIAL by Bryan Washington (Riverhead Books)

Nonfiction

• THE BROKEN HEART OF AMERICA: St, Louis and the Violent History of the United States, by Walter Johnson (Basic Books)
• SHAKESPEARE IN A DIVIDED AMERICA: What His Plays Tell Us About Our Past and Future, by James Shapiro (Penguin Press)
• SHE COME BY IT NATURAL: Dolly Parton and the Women Who Lived Her Songs, by Sarah Smarsh (Scribner)
• CASTE: The Origins of Our Discontent, by Isabel Wilkerson (Random House)
• ISLAND ON FIRE: The Revolt That Ended Slavery in the British Empire, by Tom Zoellner (Harvard University Press)

Poetry

• OBIT: Poems, by Victoria Chang (Copper Canyon Press)
• HERE IS THE SWEET HAND: Poems, by Francine J. Harris (Farrar, Straus and Giroux)
• IMPERIAL LIQUOR: Poems, by Amaud Jamaul Johnson (University of Pittsburgh Press)
• THE SHORE by Chris Nealon (Wave Books)
• HOMIE: Poems, by Danez Smith (Graywolf Press)

The John Leonard Award for Best First Book

• MILL TOWN: Reckoning with What Remains, by Kerri Arsenault (St. Martin’s Press)
• THE UNDOCUMENTED AMERICANS by Karla Cornejo Villavicencio (One World)
• LUSTER by Raven Leilani (Farrar, Straus and Giroux)
• A BURNING by Megha Majumdar (Knopf)
• SHUGGIE BAIN by Douglas Stuart (Grove Press)
• REAL LIFE by Brandon Taylor (Riverhead Books)
• HOW MUCH OF THESE HILLS IS GOLD by C Pam Zhang (Riverhead Books)

The Nona Balakian Citation for Excellence in Reviewing

• Jo Livingstone

The Ivan Sandrof Award for Lifetime Achievement

• The Feminist Press at the City University of New York