Some cool literary news... This week, Karen Tei Yamashita's novel I Hotel
was announced as one of the 20 finalists for the National Book Awards, one of the most significant accolades in American literature. Better luck next time, Jonathan Franzen!I Hotel, divided into ten parts, is a sprawling historical novel set in the San Francisco Bay Area during the Asian American civil rights movement with a diverse cast of characters from the community. I haven't read it yet, but it sounds awesome. Here's the publisher's description:
Monica Youn's poetry collection Ignatz
This dazzling, multi-voiced fusion of fiction, playwriting, graphic art, and philosophy spins an epic tale of America's struggle for civil rights as it played out in San Francisco. Divided into ten novellas, one for each year, I Hotel begins in 1968, when Martin Luther King and Bobby Kennedy were assassinated, students took to the streets, the Vietnam War raged, and cities burned.
As Yamashita's motley cast of students, laborers, artists, revolutionaries, and provocateurs make their way through the history of the day, they become caught in a riptide of politics and passion, clashing ideologies, and personal turmoil. And by the time the survivors unite to save the International Hotel—epicenter of the Yellow Power Movement—their stories have come to define the very heart of the American experience.
is also a finalist for poetry. And Paul Yoon's short story collection Once the Shore
was named one of the National Book Foundation's annual "5 Under 35," recognizing the work of young writers. The winners in fiction, nonfiction, poetry and young adult literature will be announced at a ceremony on November 17.
And finally, in other literary news, Andrew Xia Fukuda's amazing debut novel Crossing
, which I've written about before, has been selected by Booklist as a Top 10 First Novel of 2010. You can read their interview with Andrew here: The Booklist Interview: Andrew Xia Fukuda.