New goal, starting today: Read all the winners of the National Book Award for Fiction between now and next April.
After tracking what I’ve read from the various lists from the Pulitzer, the Man Booker, the Book Critics Circle, I’ve realized that I tend to like what the National Book Award picks best, so, why not read them all?
The National Book Award started in 1950, so I have some catching up to do. Let the NBA Challenge begin!
Of the books that have received this award so far, I have read 15 to date.
Thus, here are the books I still need to read, in chronological order:
- 1950: The Man with the Golden Arm by Nelson Algren
- 1951: The Collected Stories of William Faulkner by William Faulkner
- 1952: From Here to Eternity by James Jones
- 1955: A Fable by William Faulkner
- 1956: Ten North Frederick by John O’Hara
- 1957: The Field of Vision by Wright Morris
- 1958: The Wapshot Chronicle by John Cheever
- 1959: The Magic Barrel by Bernard Malamud
- 1960: Goodbye, Columbus by Philip Roth
- 1961: The Waters of Kronos by Conrad Richter
- 1962: The Moviegoer by Walker Percy
- 1963: Morte D’Urban by J. F. Powers
- 1964: The Centaur by John Updike
- 1965: Herzog by Saul Bellow
- 1966: The Collected Stories of Katherine Anne Porter by Katherine Anne Porter
- 1967: The Fixer by Bernard Malamud
- 1968: The Eighth Day by Thornton Wilder
- 1969: Steps by Jerzy Kosinski
- 1973: Augustus by John Williams
- 1973: Chimera by John Barth
- 1974: A Crown of Feathers and Other Stories by Isaac Bashevis Singer
- 1974: Gravity’s Rainbow by Thomas Pynchon
- 1975: Dog Soldiers by Robert Stone
- 1975: The Hair of Harold Roux by Thomas Williams
- 1976: JR by William Gaddis
- 1977: The Spectator Bird by Wallace Stegner
- 1978: Blood Tie by Mary Lee Settle
- 1979: Going After Cacciato by Tim O’Brien
- 1980: The World According to Garp by John Irving
- 1981: Plains Song by Wright Morris
- 1981: The Stories of John Cheever by John Cheever
- 1982: Rabbit Is Rich by John Updike
- 1982: So Long, See You Tomorrow by William Maxwell
- 1984: Victory over Japan: A Book of Stories by Ellen Gilchrist
- 1985: White Noise by Don DeLillo
- 1986: World’s Fair by E. L. Doctorow
- 1987: Paco’s Story by Larry Heinemann
- 1988: Paris Trout by Pete Dexter
- 1989: Spartina by John Casey
- 1990: Middle Passage by Charles Johnson
- 1994: A Frolic of His Own by William Gaddis
- 1995: Sabbath’s Theater by Philip Roth
- 1996: Ship Fever and Other Stories by Andrea Barrett
- 1997: Cold Mountain by Charles Frazier
- 1998: Charming Billy by Alice McDermott
- 2000: In America, Susan Sontag
- 2002: Three Junes by Julia Glass
- 2003: The Great Fire by Shirley Hazzard
- 2004: The News from Paraguay by Lily Tuck
- 2005: Europe Central by William T. Vollmann
- 2006: The Echo Maker by Richard Powers
- 2007: Tree of Smoke by Denis Johnson
- 2008: Shadow Country by Peter Matthiessen
- 2009: Let the Great World Spin by Colum McCann
- 2010: Lord of Misrule by Jaimy Gordon
- 2012: The Round House by Louise Erdrich
- 2013: The Good Lord Bird by James McBride
I’m going to start with Herzog, because that’s up next in my book club queue, so it’s perfect timing.
The downside is that there are books on here that I’m not looking forward to, and this is a very man-heavy list. I’ve also done my best to avoid all of Updike and most of Roth thus far, le sigh. And so many war novels get so many prizes! But I’m committed.
Any advice from this list on what I should tackle after Herzog?
