National Book Awards Challenge

While I was at BEA a while back I met a couple of lovely people from the National Book Foundation. They brought to my attention the fact that this is the 60th Anniversary of the National Book Awards. They will be celebrating this all of July with various people commenting on past winners. (I will post a link as soon as their blog is up.) I was looking over the list of past winners and thought it would be a great idea to do a National Book Awards Challenge. I can't believe I've only read one of these (The Color Purple). I do own three others though.

If you'd like to participate, here are some options for you:

Option 1: Bronze Medal
Read one book from the list between June 15th and July 31st.

Option 2: Silver Medal
Read three books from the list between June 15th and July 31st.

Option 3: Gold Medal
Read five books from the list between June 15th and July 31st.


National Book Awards List

1950 The Man with the Golden Arm - Nelson Algren
1951 The Collected Stories of William Faulkner - William Faulkner
1952 From Here to Eternity - James Jones
1953 Invisible Man - Ralph Ellison
1954 The Adventures of Augie March - Saul Bellow
1955 A Fable - William Faulkner
1956 Ten North Frederick - John O'Hara
1957 The Field of Vision - Wright Morris
1958 The Wapshot Chronicle - John Cheever
1959 The Magic Barrel - Bernard Malamud
1960 Goodbye Columbus - Philip Roth
1961 The Waters of Kronos - Conrad Richter
1962 The Moviegoer - Walker Percy
1963 Morte D'Urban - J.F. Powers
1964 The Centaur - John Updike
1965 Herzog - Saul Bellow Herzog
1966 The Collected Stories - Katherine Anne Porter
1967 The Fixer - Bernard Malamud
1968 The Eighth Day - Thornton Wilder
1969 Jerzy Kosinski - Steps
1970 Them - Joyce Carol Oates
1971 Mr. Sammler's Planet - Saul Bellow
1972 The Complete Storie - Flannery O'Connor
1973 Chimera - John Barth
1973 Augustus - John Williams
1974 Gravity's Rainbow - Thomas Pynchon
1974 Crown of Feathers and Other Stories - Isaac Bashevis Singer
1975 Dog Soldiers - Robert Stone
1975 The Hair of Harold Roux - Thomas Williams
1976 JR - William Gaddis
1977 The Spectator Bird - Wallace Stegner
1977 Master Tung's Western Chamber Romance - Li Li Chen
1978 Blood Tie - Mary Lee Settle
1979 Going After Cacciato - Tim O'Brien
1980 The World According to Garp - John Irving
1980 Sophie's Choice - William Styron
1981 Plains Song - Wright Morris Plains Song
1982 Rabbit is Rich - John Updike
1983 The Women of Brewster Place - Gloria Naylor
1983 The Color Purple - Alice Walker
1984 Victory Over Japan - Ellen Gilchrist
1985 White Noise - Don DeLillo
1986 World's Fair - E.L. Doctorow
1986 Arctic Dreams - Barry Lopez
1987 Paco's Story - Larry Heinemann
1988 Paris Trout - Pete Dexter
1989 Spartina - John Casey
1990 Middle Passage - Charles Johnson
1991 Mating - Norman Rush
1992 All the Pretty Horses - Cormac McCarthy
1993 The Shipping News - E. Annie Proulx
1994 A Frolic of His Own - William Gaddis
1995 Sabbath's Theater - Philip Roth Sabbath's
1996 Ship Fever and Other Stories - Andrea Barrett
1997 Cold Mountain - Charles Frazier
1998 Charming Billy - Alice McDermott
1999 Waiting - Ha Jin
2000 In America - Susan Sontag
2001 The Corrections - Jonathan Franzen
2002 Three Junes - Julia Glass
2003 The Great Fire - Shirley Hazzard
2004 The News From Paraguay - Lily Tuck
2005 Europe Central - William T. Vollmann
2006 The Echo Maker - Richard Powers
2007 Tree of Smoke - Denis Johnson
2008 Shadow Country - Peter Matthiessen