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Awards & Book News

Norwegian novelist and playwright Jon Fosse—author of, most recently, A Shining, tr. by Damion Searles (Transit), and Septology, tr. by Damion Searles (Transit)—wins the Nobel Prize for Literature for his “innovative plays and prose which give voice to the unsayable.” Washington Post, The Guardian, USA Today, LA Times, and PBS Canvas have coverage. NYT also has a quiz on the history of the Nobel Prize for literature and an explanation of how the prize is awarded.

Fiction finalists are announced for the Kirkus Prize.

The Goldsmiths Book Prize shortlist is announced. The Guardian has coverage.

The shortlist for the Bollinger Everyman Wodehouse Prize for comic fiction is announced, The Guardian reports. The Bookseller also has coverage.

USA Today reports how “one low-tech website helped fuel the national book ban surge.”

PEN America is opening an office in Florida to combat the state’s book bans; Kirkus has reporting.

Kids share their thoughts on banned books on NPR.

New Title Best Sellers

Links for the week: NYT Hardcover Fiction Best Sellers | NYT Hardcover Nonfiction Best Sellers | USA Today Best-Selling Books

Fiction

The Running Grave by Robert Galbraith (Mulholland) runs to No. 2 on the NYT Hardcover Fiction Best Sellers list and No. 7 on the USA Today Best-Selling Books list.

The Armor of Light by Ken Follett (Viking) defends No. 3 on the NYT Hardcover Fiction Best Sellers list.

12 Months To Live by James Patterson and Mike Lupica (Little, Brown) holds on to No. 5 on the NYT Hardcover Fiction Best Sellers list.

The Fragile Threads of Power by V.E. Schwab (Tor) sews up No. 6 on the NYT Hardcover Fiction Best Sellers list.

Bright Lights, Big Christmas by Mary Kay Andrews (St. Martin’s) glows at No. 9 on the NYT Hardcover Fiction Best Sellers list.

Nonfiction

Enough by Cassidy Hutchinson (S. & S.) takes No. 1 on the NYT Hardcover Nonfiction Best Sellers list.

Killing the Witches: The Horror of Salem, Massachusetts by Bill O'Reilly and Martin Dugard (St. Martin’s) kills at No. 2 on the NYT Hardcover Nonfiction Best Sellers list.

Democracy Awakening: Notes on the State of America by Heather Cox Richardson (Viking) awakens at No. 4 on the NYT Hardcover Nonfiction Best Sellers list and on the USA Today Best-Selling Books list.

Thicker than Water by Kerry Washington (Little, Brown, Spark) flows to No. 6 on the NYT Hardcover Nonfiction Best Sellers list.

The Fall: The End of Fox News and the Murdoch Dynasty by Michael Wolff (Holt) rises to No. 14 on the NYT Hardcover Nonfiction Best Sellers list.

Reviews

Washington Post reviews Paris Notebooks: Essays and Reviews by Mavis Gallant (Nonpareil): “This new edition’s brilliant foreword, by biographer and critic Hermione Lee, alone may justify the book’s price. Happily, no such justification’s needed: Page after page, Gallant dazzles”; and A Day in the Life of Abed Salama: Anatomy of a Jerusalem Tragedy by Nathan Thrall (Metropolitan: Holt; LJ starred review): “Closely examines the intricacies of injustice perpetrated on the Palestinian population by the Israeli government, its systems and plenty of its Jewish citizens. Yet it does so with an almost clinical remove.”

LA Times reviews Madonna: A Rebel Life by Mary Gabriel (Little, Brown; LJ starred review): “There is a lot to like about and learn from Madonna: A Rebel Life; the depth of your ‘Madge’ worship will determine whether you will go the distance with it”; and Our Strangers: Stories by Lydia Davis (Bookshop Editions): “Davis’s fussiness evokes watchmakers or jewelers, but those analogies miss her humor. Indeed, her MO is a little closer to Buster Keaton’s.”

LitHub has “5 book reviews you need to read this week.”

Briefly Noted

EW has the news that RuPaul will publish a memoir, The House of Hidden Meanings, about the first 40 years of his life, due out from Dey Street in March 2024.

Rebel Wilson says she reveals her “deepest secrets” in her upcoming memoir, Rebel Rising, due out from S. & S. in April 2024; People has coverage.

The Guardian rounds up the best descriptions of loneliness in literature.

Tor.com discusses SF novels about doomed-to-fail generation ships.

CrimeReads identifies “five disturbing books that violate your sanctuary.”

PW has five witchy new books for Friday the 13th and the 10 best histories of women in WWII.

Banana Yoshimoto, author of The Premonition, tr. by Asa Yoneda (Counterpoint), answers NYT’s “By the Book” questions.

Jonathan Lethem, author of Brooklyn Crime Novel (Ecco), answers the LitHub Questionnaire.

NYT’s “Inside the Best-Seller List” covers Of Time and Turtles: Mending the World, Shell by Shattered Shell by Sy Montgomery (text) & Matt Patterson (illus.) (Mariner).

New York Magazine has an excerpt from Ziwe’s debut essay collection, Black Friend (Abrams Image).

Authors on Air

NPR talks to Alix E. Harrow, author of Starling House (Tor; LJ starred review).

NPR’s Fresh Air talks to Safiya Sinclair, author of How To Say Babylon (S. & S.).

LitHub’s The Maris Review podcast talks to C Pam Zhang, author of Land of Milk and Honey (Riverhead), while the Fiction/Non/Fiction podcast talks to Alex Reisner about his recent Atlantic articles on Books3, a massive data set that includes hundreds of thousands of pirated e-books.

ShelfAwareness rounds up the docket for C-SPAN 2’s Book TV this weekend.

Tomorrow, Live with Kelly and Mark will host Keegan-Michael Key and Elle Key, authors of The History of Sketch Comedy: A Journey Through the Art and Craft of Humor (Chronicle).

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