The National Book Critics Circle awarded prizes this year to a range of writers including Nobel laureate Han Kang, memoirist Arundhati Roy and technology journalist Karen Hao.
Han Kang’s novel We Do Not Part, translated by e. yaewon and Paige Aniyah Morris, examines the 1948–49 uprising on Jeju Island, where thousands were killed. Heather Scott Partington, chair of the awards’ fiction committee, described the book as a haunting, melancholic work whose atmosphere and language linger like a dream.
The lifetime achievement award went to author and journalist Frances FitzGerald, whose 1972 book Fire in the Lake provided an early, influential perspective on the Vietnam War. The institution achievement honor was shared by NPR and PBS; Jacob M. Appel, who chaired the selection process, praised both organizations for their contributions to book culture and to American democracy.
Other category winners included:
– Karen Hao, Empire of AI: Dreams and Nightmares in Sam Altman’s OpenAI (nonfiction)
– Arundhati Roy, Mother Mary Comes to Me (autobiography)
– Alex Green, A Perfect Turmoil: Walter E. Fernald and the Struggle to Care for America’s Disabled (biography)
– Kevin Young, Night Watch (poetry)
– Neige Sinno, Sad Tiger, translated by Natasha Lehrer (translation prize, honoring author and translator)
Founded in New York in 1974, the National Book Critics Circle comprises more than 850 critics and editors and gives annual awards recognizing the best books published in the United States over the past year.
