Igbo and Tamil writer, Akwaeke Emezi, longlisted for the 2019 National Book Awards for her book, “Pet.”
Founded in 1950 by the National Book Foundation a nonprofit organization, the National Book Awards is an annual U.S. prize, awarded to the best title published in the United States and written by an American citizen.
The award recognizes the best fiction, nonfiction, poetry, translated literature, and young people’s literature.
This year’s award which is the 70th, has twenty-five judges for all five categories of the award. The longlist selected by the judges are fifty, ten in each category.
Akwaeke Emezi’s book was longlisted alongside nine others, in the category of young people’s literature. “Pet,” follows a teenage transgender living in a dystopia plagued by monsters.
The shortlists of twenty-five, five for each category, would be announced on the 8th of October, 2019. Winners in all five categories will be announced at the 70th National Book Awards Ceremony and Benefit Dinner on the 20th of, November, 2019.
The longlist of ten in the category of young people’s literature are;
Kwame Alexander; illustrations by Kadir Nelson, “The Undefeated” Versify / Houghton Mifflin Harcourt
Laurie Halse Anderson, “SHOUT” Viking Books for Young Readers / Penguin Random House
Akwaeke Emezi, “Pet” Make Me a World / Penguin Random House
Cynthia Kadohata; Illustrations by Julia Kuo, “A Place to Belong” Atheneum/Caitlyn Dlouhy Books / Simon & Schuster
Jason Reynolds, “Look Both Ways: A Tale Told in Ten Blocks” Atheneum/Caitlyn Dlouhy Books / Simon & Schuster
Randy Ribay, “Patron Saints of Nothing” Kokila / Penguin Random House
Laura Ruby, “Thirteen Doorways, Wolves Behind Them All” Balzer + Bray / HarperCollins Publishers
Martin W. Sandler, “1919: The Year That Changed America” Bloomsbury Children’s Books / Bloomsbury Publishing
Hal Schrieve, “Out of Salem” Triangle Square / Seven Stories Press
Colleen AF Venable and Ellen T. Crenshaw, “Kiss Number 8″ First Second Books / Macmillan Publishers