The Commonwealth Club announced the nominees in six categories for its definitive Califonia Book Awards today — and as usual it’s full of stuff I’m dying to read. Why are literary awards, in particular, among the sharpest admonishments for wasting one’s life on social media?
Well, screw you, Reza Aslan, and your Fox News-incinerating Zealot: The Life and Times of Jesus of Nazareth — I’ve Pinterested all the parody Kimye Vogue covers and publicly dissected that “Black Jeopardy” skit from last week’s SNL on Facebook.
Anyway, here are your nominees. Winners will be announced June 9 at a 6pm ceremony at the Commonewealth Club, open to the public. I’ll probably be too busy scanning #tbt pics, sigh.
FICTION
Daniel Alarcon: At Night We Walk in Circles, Blackstone Audio
Eli Brown: Cinnamon and Gunpowder, Farrar, Straus and Giroux
Karen Joy Fowler: We Are All Completely Beside Ourselves, Plume
David Vann: Goat Mountain, Harper
FIRST FICTION
Andrew Lam: Birds of Paradise Lost, Red Hen Press
Anthony Marra: A Constellation of Vital Phenomena, Hogarth
NONFICTION
Reza Aslan: Zealot: The Life and Times of Jesus of Nazareth, Random House
A. Scott Berg: Wilson, Putnam Adult
S Lochlann Jain: Malignant: How Cancer Becomes Us, University of California Press
Eric Schlosser: Command And Control: Nuclear Weapons, the Damascus Accident, and the Illusion of Safety, Penguin Press HC
Amy Wilentz: Farewell, Fred Voodoo: A Letter from Haiti, Simon & Schuster
POETRY
George Albon: Fire Break, Nightboat
Victoria Chang: The Boss, McSweeney’s
Brenda Hillman: Seasonal Works With Letters On Fire, Wesleyan
Alli Warren: Here Come The Warm Jets, City Lights Publishers
Allison Benis White: Small Porcelain Head, Four Way
JUVENILE
Drew Daywalt: The Day The Crayons Quit, Philomel
Elisa Kleven: Glasswings: A Butterfly’s Story, Dial
Marissa Moss: Barbed Wire Baseball, Harry N. Abrams
Annemarie O’Brien: Lara’s Gift, Knopf Books for Young Readers
Lemony Snicket: The Dark, Little, Brown Books for Young Readers
YOUNG ADULT
Stephanie Kuehn: Charm & Strange, St. Martin’s Griffin
Robin LaFevers: Dark Triumph, HMH Books for Young Readers
Tom McNeal: Far Far Away, Knopf Books for Young Readers
Elizabeth Ross: Belle Epoque, Delacorte Books for Young Readers
Gene Luen Yang: Boxers & Saints (2 Volumes), First Second