NEW YORK (AP) 鈥 A posthumous memoir by Russian opposition leader Alexei Navalny, Hisham Matar's novel 鈥淢y Friends鈥 and a poetry collection by Anne Carson were among the winners Thursday night of the 50th annual National Book Critics Circle awards.
Winner in the autobiography category, Navalny's 鈥漃atriot," which came out eight months after he died in prison, was a blunt and improbably optimistic account of his years of oppression and confinement. Alfred A. Knopf publisher Jordan Pavlin accepted the award on his behalf, telling hundreds gathered at the New School Auditorium in Manhattan that 鈥樷檌t was very difficult to conceive of a leader as committed to his country, his people and ideals as Navalny was."
Her voice sometimes halting with emotion, Pavlin called his book 鈥渦ncannily relevant to America in 2025.鈥
Winners of the other categories:
鈥 Matar's contrasting narratives of three Libyans living in London won for fiction, with finalists including winner of the National Book Award and the Kirkus Prize.
鈥 Adam Higginbothamsa国际传媒 鈥淐hallenger: A True Story of Heroism and Disaster on the Edge of Space鈥 won for nonfiction.
鈥 Carson's collection 鈥淲rong Norma鈥 won poetry.
鈥 Cynthia Carrsa国际传媒 鈥淐andy Darling: Dreamer, Icon, Superstar" won for biography
鈥 Hanif Abdurraqib's 鈥淭heresa国际传媒 Always This Year: On Basketball and Ascension鈥 won for criticism
鈥 Pedro Lemebel's 鈥淎 Last Supper of Queer Apostles,鈥 translated from the Spanish by Gwendolyn Harper, won for a work in translation.
鈥 Tessa Hulls' 鈥淔eeding Ghosts: A Graphic Memoir鈥 won the John Leonard Prize for best debut book. Leonard, a renowned critic who died in 2008, helped found the NBCC in 1974.
Honorary awards were presented to 鈥淭he House On Mango Street鈥 author Sandra Cisneros, the Black-owned publisher Third World Press, critic Lauren Michele Jackson and author-educator Lori Lynn Turner. Maxine Hong Kingston, whose classic 鈥淭he Woman Warrior鈥 received an NBCC award in 1977, was a keynote speaker.
