Egan, Ward earn nominations at National Book Awards

NEW YORK >> Jennifer Egan and Jesmyn Ward, prize-winning authors with new novels out this fall, are on the fiction long list for the National Book Awards.

The National Book Foundation announced 10 fiction nominees today, completing a week in which long lists also were released for poetry, young people’s literature and nonfiction. Short lists of five in each category come out Oct. 4. Winners will be announced Nov. 15 during a Manhattan dinner ceremony.

Egan’s “Manhattan Beach” is her first novel since she won the Pulitzer Prize for “A Visit from the Goon Squad,” and Ward’s “Sing, Unburied, Sing” is her first novel since she won the National Book Award for “Salvage the Bones.”

Four debut authors made the list: novelists Carol Zoref for “Barren Island,” Lisa Ko for “The Leavers” and Margaret Wilkerson Sexton’s “A Kind of Freedom,” and short story writer Carmen Maria Machado’s “Her Body and Other Parties.” Daniel Alarcon’s “The King is Always Above the People” was another story collection included.

The other nominees are Elliot Ackerman’s “Dark at the Crossing,” Charmaine Craig’s “Miss Burma? and Min Jin Lee’s “Pachinko.”

A panel of five fiction judges chose from among 394 books submitted by publishers.

Among those not nominated: George Saunders’ “Lincoln in the Bardo,” the first novel by the acclaimed short story writer; Claire Messud’s “The Burning Girl”; and Nicole Krauss’ “Forest Dark.”