Today, the National Book Foundation announced the finalists in all five categories—Fiction, Nonfiction, Poetry, Translated Literature, and Young People’s Literature—for the 2026 National Book Awards.
The winners will be announced at the 77th National Book Awards Ceremony & Benefit Dinner in New York City; winners will each receive $10,000, a bronze medal, and a statue; all finalists will receive $1,000 and a bronze medal.
Until then, here are the finalists:
FICTION:
Hannah Lillith Assadi, Paradiso 17
Knopf / Penguin Random House
Edwidge Danticat, Dèy
Knopf / Penguin Random House
Julián Delgado Lopera, Pretend You’re Dead and I Carry You
Liveright / W. W. Norton & Company
Valeria Luiselli, Beginning Middle End
Knopf / Penguin Random House
Morgan Thomas, Mad Eden
MCD / Farrar, Straus and Giroux / Macmillan Publishers
*
NONFICTION:
Colin Asher, The Midnight Special: The Secret Prison History of American Music
W. W. Norton & Company
Abdelrahman ElGendy, Huna: A Memoir of Revolution, Prison, and Becoming
Hogarth / Penguin Random House
Camonghne Felix, Let the Poets Govern: A Declaration of Freedom
One World / Penguin Random House
Sara Nović, Mother Tongue
Random House / Penguin Random House
Joseph Osmundson, Spawning Season: An Experiment in Queer Parenthood
Bloomsbury Publishing
*
POETRY:
Victoria Chang, Tree of Knowledge
Farrar, Straus and Giroux / Macmillan Publishers
Carolina Ebeid, Hide
Graywolf Press
Brenda Hillman, Still House in the Desert: An eco-contemplation
Wesleyan University Press
Fady Joudah, Exhibit G: Poems, Essays, and Photographs of Gaza
Milkweed Editions
Susan Stewart, Bramble
University of Chicago Press
*
TRANSLATED LITERATURE:
Karl Ove Knausgaard, The School of Night
Translated from the Norwegian by Martin Aitken
Penguin Press / Penguin Random House
Vicente Luis Mora, Centroeuropa
Translated from the Spanish by Rahul Bery
Bellevue Literary Press
Intan Paramaditha, Night of a Thousand Hells
Translated from the Indonesian by Stephen Epstein and Tiffany Tsao
Europa Editions
Mohamed Mbougar Sarr, Pure Men
Translated from the French by Lara Vergnaud
Other Press
Samar Yazbek, Your Presence Is a Danger to Your Life: Voices of Survival and Witness in Gaza
Translated from the Arabic by Leri Price
Other Press
*
YOUNG PEOPLE’S LITERATURE:
Elana K. Arnold, Holloway
Clarion Books / HarperCollins Publishers
Tae Keller, When Tomorrow Burns
Random House Books for Young Readers / Penguin Random House
Keala Kendall, That Which Feeds Us: A Hawaiian Gothic
Random House Books for Young Readers / Penguin Random House
David Levithan and Gabriel Duckels, The Fight of Our Lives: AIDS in America
Knopf Books for Young Readers / Penguin Random House
Julian Randall, Shook
Henry Holt and Company (BYR) / Macmillan Publishers