Anita Mechler

Shortlists are announced for the 2022 Diverse Book Awards and Kindle Storyteller Award. Author interviews are plentiful this week, including conversations with Jarvis Jay Masters, Melissa Villaseñor, Kamila Shamsie, Ling Ma, Sonya Huber, Omolola Ijeoma Ogunyemim, Chelsea Martin, Linda Ronstadt, Constance Wu, Calvin Kasulke, Abdulrazak Gurnah, and Dr. John Gottman and Dr. Julie Schwartz Gottman; also, rare and early interviews with Cormac McCarthy. There will be a new partnership in book adaptations between Titan Books and Alcon Publishing.

There are awards announcements for the Center for Fiction First Novel Prize, the Edna Staebler Award for Creative Nonfiction, and the Dayton Literary Peace Prize. Starting at the top of the best-sellers lists are Dreamland by Nicholas Sparks, The Bullet That Missed: A Thursday Murder Club Mystery by Richard Osman, Lucy by the Sea by Elizabeth Strout, The Divider: Trump in the White House, 2017–2021 by Peter Baker and Susan Glasser, and Starry Messenger: Cosmic Perspectives on Civilization by Neil deGrasse Tyson. Also, interviews with Ingrid Rojas Contreras and Jasmine Guillory, and Fresh Air revisits a 2012 interview with the late Hilary Mantel.

Book prize announcements abound including the 2022 Cundill History Prize shortlist, CBC Nonfiction Prize, Wilbur Smith Adventure Writing Prize, and the Financial Times Book of the Year shortlist. There is more coverage on book banning for Banned Books Week and of author Hilary Mantel’s passing. Author interviews showcase conversations with Tracey Lien, Yiyun Li, Cai Emmons, Robert Hardman, Peter Baker and Susan Glasser. There is adaptation news for Anthony Horowitz’s book Magpie Murders.

There are announcements for the 2022 Baillie Gifford Prize for Nonfiction longlist and the PEN Presents shortlist. Best sellers abound this week featuring top books such as The Butcher and the Wren by Alaina Urquhart, Oath of Loyalty by Vince Flynn and Kyle Mills, Nona the Ninth by Tamsyn Muir, Blowback by James Patterson and Brendan DuBois, What If? 2: Additional Serious Scientific Answers to Absurd Hypothetical Questions by Randall Munroe, Holding the Line: Inside the Nation’s Preeminent US Attorney’s Office and Its Battle with the Trump Justice Department by Geoffrey Berman, Dinners with Ruth: A Memoir on the Power of Friendships by Nina Totenberg, The Myth of Normal: Trauma, Illness, and Healing in a Toxic Culture by Gabor Maté with Daniel Maté. Author interviews explore conversations with Nada Alic, Richard Osman, Orlando Figes, Edward Enninful, and Yiyun Li.

The 2022 National Book Awards for Nonfiction and Poetry longlists are out. The 2022 BBC National Short Story Award shortlist is also announced. LibraryReads has released the top ten books published in October. Conversations arrive with Javier Zamora, Mitch Albom, May-lee Chai, Elissa Bassist, Ling Ma, Jane Jensen (aka Eli Easton), Andrea Barrett, Buzz Bissinger, and Woo-kyoung Ahn. Adaptations are being made of Steven Rowley’s The Guncle and Heather O’Neill’s Lullabies for Little Criminals.

The 2022 National Book Awards for Translated Literature longlist is out. More award news includes the Northern California Book winners and the Mo Siewcharran Prize shortlist. At the top of the best sellers lists this week are Fairy Tale by Stephen King, Desperation in Death by J. D. Robb, The Marriage Portrait by Maggie O’Farrell, Solito by Javier Zamora, and Slouching Towards Utopia: An Economic History of the Twentieth Century by J. Bradford DeLong. Author interviews feature conversations with Gabriel Blackwell, Joe Pompeo, W. David Marx, Celeste Headlee, Lisa McNair, and Nina Totenberg. Plus, an adaptation for Geraldine Brooks’s Horse is in the works.

Award news arrives for the 2022 Kirkus Prize, James Cropper Wainwright Prize, and CBC Nonfiction Prize. Angry Robot, a publisher known for science fiction titles, is launching a crime fiction imprint called Datura Books. Also, page to screen.

Tracie D. Hall, Executive Director of the American Library Association, receives the 2022 Literarian Award for Outstanding Service to the American Literary Community from the National Book Foundation. The 2022 New Atlantic Independent Booksellers Association Books of the Year winners are out, as are the Dragon, Eugie, and Mike Resnick Memorial Awards. Rising to the top of the bestseller lists are Carrie Soto Is Back by Taylor Jenkins Reid, The Ink Black Heart by Robert Galbraith, and Other Birds by Sarah Addison Allen. Mercedes Lackey’s "Valdemar" book series will be adapted for television.

There is more news coverage on local libraries and book banning and a save from Nora Roberts to a defunded Michigan library. Book recommendations arrive for Fall. Rising to the top of the best sellers list this week are Babel by R.F. Kuang, Girl, Forgotten by Karin Slaughter, Soul Taken by Patricia Briggs, and Breaking History: A White House Memoir by Jared Kushner.