National Book Awards - 2011

Fiction: Jesmyn Ward, Salvage the bones
A widower and his four children living in rural Mississippi face Hurricane Katrina.

Nonfiction: Stephen Greenblatt, The Swerve: How the World Became Modern
How the salvage and dissemination of Lucretius’ philosophical epic, “On the nature of things,” sparked the Renaissance.

Young People’s Literature : Thanhha Lai, Inside Out & Back Again
The story of a young Vietnamese refugee as she struggles to adjust to life in America.

Poetry: Nikky Finney, Head Off & Split
Poetry about the “emblematic figures and events in African American life. . . from Rosa Parks to Condoleezze Rice to a woman on a rooftop during Hurricane Katrina. . . . [Her poems] ask us to be mindful of what we fraction, fragment, cut off, dice, dishonor, or throw away. . .” (Amazon.com ; 11/17/11)

Lifetime Achievement Award:
Poet John Ashbery, 84, received the Medal for Distinguished Contribution to American Letters.

Literarian Award for Outstanding Service to the American Literary Community:
Mitchell Kaplan, a bookstore owner in Florida and a driving force behind the East Coast's largest literary festival, the Miami Book Fair International.

(from http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/nation/la-na-book-awards-20111117,0,292135.story)