Random Cat September 2021

Winner, winner, chicken dinner!:) This month we will be reading books that have been awarded a specific literature prize. There are too many to list, but here are a few:



The Pulitzer Prize- given annually is an award for achievements in newspaper, magazine, online journalism, literature and musical composition within the United States. It was established in 1917 by provisions in the will of Joseph Pulitzer, who had made his fortune as a newspaper publisher. It is administered by Columbia University.
Fiction Winners:
2021 The Night Watchman by Louise Edrich
2020 The Nickel Boys by Colson Whitehead
2019 The Overstory by Richard Powers

Non-Fiction Winners:
2021 Wilmington’s Lie: The Murderous Coup of 1898 and the Rise of White Supremacy by David Zucchino
2020 The End of the Myth: From the Frontier to the Border Wall in the Mind of America by Greg Grandon
2019 Amity and Prosperity: One Family and the Fracturing of America by Eliza Griswold

Winners from previous years and categories can be found here: https://www.pulitzer.org/prize-winners-by-year

Nobel Prize for Literature-A Swedish literature prize funded by Alfred Nobel (inventor of dynamite) and presented by a committee for literature that has “produced the most outstanding work in an idealistic direction.” Nobel prizes are not given for a specific work, but to a specific author based on a body of their work.

2021 Winner: Not yet awarded (Oct. 13)

2020 Winner: Louise Gluck, English/Swedish poet for her commentaries on other poets/poems

2019 Winner: Peter Handke, a German novelist and playwright. Most of his works are in German, but he did translate several plays into English.

Winners from previous years can be found here: https://www.nobelprize.org/prizes/lists/all-nobel-prizes-in-literature/

Man-Booker Prize- is a literary prize awarded each year for the best novel written in English and published in the United Kingdom or Ireland.



2021 Winner-Not yet announced
2020 Winner Shuggie Bain by Douglas Stuart
2019 Winner: two winners this year: 1) Testaments by Margaret Atwood and 2) Girl, Woman, Other by Bernardine Evaristo

more winners here: https://thebookerprizes.com/fiction/backlist/2021

The National Book Award is given to works of American literature to insure that books will always have a place in American culture.



2021 Winner: Not yet announced
2020 Winner: Interior Chinatown by Charles Yu
2019 Winner: Trust Exercise: A Novel by Susan Choi
2018 Winner: The Friend (children’s book) by Sigrid Nunez

International Booker Prize-a warded annually for a single book, translated into English and published in the UK or Ireland.



2021-Not yet announced
2020 Winner: The Discomfort of Evening by Marieke Lucas Rijneveld
2019 Winner: Celestial Bodies by Jokha Alharthi
2017 Winner: A Horse Walks Into A Bar by David Grossman

Miles-Franklin Award- s an annual literary prize awarded to "a novel which is of the highest literary merit and presents Australian life in any of its phases".



2021 Winner-Not yet awarded
2020 Winner-The Yield by Tara June Winch
2019 Winner-Too Much Lip by Melissa Lucashenko

More winners can be found here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Miles_Franklin_Award

Bram Stoker Award-annually by the Horror Writers Association for superior achievement in dark fantasy and horror writing. Stephen King has won this award multiple times.



2021-Award not yet announced
2020 Winner: The Only Good Indians by Stephen Graham Jones
2019 Winner: Coyote Rage by Owl Goingback
2018 Winner: The Cabin at the End of the World by Paul Tremblay

More winners here:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bram_Stoker_Award_for_Novel

Governor General Awards-a Canadian book award given to both French and English writers in 7 categories.



2021 Winners: Not yet awarded
2020 Winners: 5 Little Indians by Michelle Good

2019 Winners:
Fiction: Five Wives by Joan Thomas
Poetry: Holy Wild by Gwen Benaway
Non-Fiction: To the River: Losing My Brother by Don Gillmor

More winners can be found here:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Governor_General%27s_Award_for_English-language_fi...

There are over 200 book awards, too many to list here.

Here’s to some good reading! Have any recommendations? Please let us know!

Don’t forget to post in the Wiki: https://wiki.librarything.com/index.php/2021_RandomCAT

>6 Tess_W: The winner of the 2021 Miles Franklin was The Labyrinth by Amanda Lohrey. I read it as part of my prize winners category and gave it 4 stars.
I've also read The Yield which was the 2020 winner. Another fantastic book.

I have the winner of the 2021 Stella Prize on my TBR, The Bass Rock, apparently a 'gothic tale of toxic masculinity'. You had me at 'gothic'!

The Stella is for Australian women writers of fiction.
https://thestellaprize.com.au/

I also read from the Newbery Medal list, for children/middle grade books.
https://www.ala.org/alsc/awardsgrants/bookmedia/newbery

Great theme - I love reading prize winners!

I have a few prize contenders that I am planning on reading next month but only two that actually won:

Sharp Objects by Gillian Flynn - winner of the 2007 CWA Steel Dagger
The Good Thief by Hannah Tinti - winner of the 2009 Alex Award

I have several options for this challenge. Nobel, Booker and Governor General award winners are at the top of the list.

Oh hey, The Diviners, by Margaret Laurence, is on my on-deck pile AND it won the Governor General's Award for English Fiction in 1966. This will be my pick then :)

Still not decided - I have on my physical book pile:

The Mermaid of Black Conch which won the 2020 Costa award
The Bass Rock which won the 2021 Stella Prize
The Manningtree Witches which won the 2021 Desmond Elliott prize
Our Endless Numbered Days which won the 2015 Desmond Elliott and I still have not got to!

The possibilities are endless!

I was planning on reading The Conservationist by Nadine Gordimer (Booker, 1974) in July but didn't get round to it. So now's its chance.

Our book club read for Sep is The Round House by Louise Erdrich (National Book Award 2012) so that will be my read even though I'll be reading it this month since book club is Sep 1.

I will probably read a Newbery or Caldecott for this challenge, as GenreCAT topic is children and YA, so I can get a CATtrick for the month.

I have a lot to choose from on my TBR. Right now I think it will be The Sympathizer by Viet Thanh Nguyen. It won the Pulitzer in 2016.

I've had The Nickel Boys for about a year. Now is a good time to read it!

I'm hoping to get to A Wizard's Guide to Defensive Baking for GenreCAT and it seems to have won a couple of awards, so I think that will be this month's pick.

I have a couple of Orange (as was) prize listed novel on the shelf, but none of the winners.

I love reading prize winners, I'll have to take a look at the shelves to see which one I fancy :) Will I be predictable and go for a Wainwright Prize nominee/winner, or will I branch out?

I have created a lengthy but interesting list of my prize winners. Too many choices!

Here's a few that have caught my eye:
Dear Committee Members by Julie Schumacher (Thurber Prize for American Humor)
Tulku by Peter Dickinson (Whitbread Book Award)
Plumb by Maurice Gee (James Tait Black Memorial Prize; New Zealand Book Award; Goodman Fielder Wattie Book Award)
Arctic Dreams by Barry Lopez (National Book Award; National Book Critics Circle Award)
Changes in the Land by William Cronon (Francis Parkman Prize)
Blacklands by Belinda Bauer (Crime Writers Association Gold Dagger)

I will probably take a closer look at my tbr tomorrow or Wed to figure out what I might read.

OK, I've decided to get out of my Wainwright Prize comfort zone (although not too far - I've just picked out one of this year's Wainwright Prize shortlisted titles from the Jar of Fate for my nature category for September, and that prize is announced on 4th Sept, so maybe I'll be able to include that one here too!). I'm going to go for a fiction prize, specifically, 2013 Costa novel award winner, Kate Atkinson's Life After Life. I've also got her follow up book, A God in Ruins, which won the same prize in 2016, so if I race through the first one maybe I'll read them both! (I know what I'm like though, especially with fiction, so I'm not going to commit myself to that :D ).

I eventually aim to read all of the Bram Stoker Award novels, and Peter Straub's Mr. X won in 1999, so that's going to be my pick for the month :)

I'm planning to read The Overstory. I had been planning to read it in October, so I'll just move it forward.

I forgot an award!

As they describe themselves - What's small, nerdy, fiercely independent and sometimes noisy? The Small Press Network's Most Underrated Book Award.

This is an Australian award and I was reminded of it by katiekrug as she recently read a book that was shortlisted for this in 2013.
Since 2020, it has been renamed as The Small Press Network Book of the Year, but still with the idea of searching out Australian titles that have not received the recognition they deserve.

A bit of an obscure award but sometimes you can find some hidden gems.

So I have now chosen my read - Songwoman by Ilka Tampke, which won the Small Press Network Book of the Year in 2019. It is a sequel to Skin and is set in Iron Age Britain on the cusp of Roman invasion.

This month I started a new category, 10 Different Prize Winners, so will read at least one in September, probably this year's Miles Franklin winner, The Labyrinth by Amanda Lohrey, and possibly The Home and the World by Rabindranath Tagore, who won a Nobel Prize.

>27 JayneCM:
>28 pamelad:

I'm making Prize Winners one of my CATS for 2022. Taking notes here........making a list.

>29 Tess_W: It is a good category - I have had it every year since I've been here. You could just read prize winners and never get through them all.

Ooh, light bulb! I could make my 2022 Bingo card all prize winners!

>30 JayneCM: Great idea!

I read Philip Roth's American Pastoral. It was an awful slog. Makes the minutiae of Melville and Dickens seem like child's play!

I’m going to read:
Shuggie Bain Booker Prize 2020
Sing Unburied Sing National Book Award 2017

>32 lsh63: Really loved Sing, Unburied, Sing Hope you enjoy it. I am hoping to get to The Nickel Boys next month. It's been on my TBR since it was published. There are some others mentioned here that are on that list as well...Mt. TBR!

Thought I'd combine this one with GenreCAT (Children's/YA) and look for a YA award winner. I'm leaning toward:

Ruby Red / Kerstin Gier

I was also considering Little Town on the Prairie as I reread the "Little House" series, but I think I want to buy the book (likely 2nd-hand) first.

I just finished a prize winner, The Mermaid of Black Conch, winner of the 2020 Costa Book of the Year. Loved it.

I finished The Round House by Louise Erdrich which won the National Book Award for Fiction in 2012. Love her writing.

I finished Shuggie Bain. It was heart wrenching and beautifully written. It won the Booker Prize in 2020.

I finished Buddenbrook on Sept 1st which was instrumental in winning Thomas Mann the Nobel Prize in 1929.

I finished A Wizard's Guide to defensive Baking which was well night perfect.

I'll be reading Circe which seems to have won a few awards.

Crow Lake / Mary Lawson
4 stars

When Kate is only 7-years old, tragedy hits her family in Northern Ontario. She and her baby sister, Bo, end up being raised by their older brothers, Luke (19-years old) and Matt (17-years old). Luke gives up his future so they can stay together, and also so Matt can finish school and continue to university (he was always the smarter one, anyway – the one expected to go to university). Kate and Matt have a bond.

Grown-up Kate, a professor in Toronto, never thought she’d fall in love, but she has. But she also has a hard time opening up to Daniel about her past and her family, even though they’ve been together for more than a year. Daniel still hasn’t even met her family.

I really liked this. It was slow-moving, but I found even the biology bits interesting. There was tension in Kate’s family, though she didn’t understand much of it when she was a kid. And the neighbours had some drama (this may be putting it lightly) going on at their place, as well. I actually read this over a decade ago, but only remembered siblings and a lake (actually it was a pond). I really didn’t remember much at all, but it was chosen as a book club book, and I’m really glad I reread it.

>41 LibraryCin: What award did it win or get listed?

>42 Kristelh: According to the common knowledge section here:

Alex Award (2003)
Books in Canada First Novel Award (2002)
Today Show Book Club selection (7)
McKitterick Prize (2003)
Pennsylvania Young Reader's Choice Award Nominee (2006.4|Young Adult, 2006)
The Economist Best Books (2002.5)

And Goodreads lists these:

McKitterick Prize (2003), ALA Alex Award (2003), Amazon.ca First Novel Award (2002), OLA Evergreen Award (2005)

>43 LibraryCin: Thanks, that's a lot of awards, looks like a good one to read. And you read it twice. Must be!

>41 LibraryCin: - I had to go back and check, but this was the first book we read for our book club when we formed one here. (We live in a newish condo development)

>44 Kristelh: Some of them are Canadian awards, so there's not as much competition, but...

>45 dudes22: Yeah, I can see this being a good one for book club discussion. We meet in a couple of weeks, so I guess we'll see how the conversation goes then!

I read Half of a Yellow Sun by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie A great historical fiction about the secession of Biafra from Nigeria. 4.5 stars Orange Prize in 2007, now called The Prize for Women's Fiction

I read Grandfather's Journey which is one of my fave Caldecott books.

I read The Nancys, which won the Ngaio Marsh Best First Novel Award. It's a crime novel set in a tiny town near Dunedin, in New Zealand's South Island.

>50 pamelad: I've got that on my virtual TBR shelf. How is it?

I read Dear Committee Members by Julie Schumacher. It won the Thurber Prize for American Humor in 2015.

>1 Tess_W: The link for The Night Watchman is incorrect. It does not lead to Louise Erdrich's novel.

>50 pamelad: It has some first novel problems - too many characters, too many plot strands - but overall it's entertaining and often funny. https://www.librarything.com/topic/333781#7596934

>53 LoisB: Fixed, TY!

I read The Second World War: Triumph and Tragedy by Winston S. Churchill.

This is the final volume of Churchill's six-volume work. The opening was for me the least interesting because it dealt with places and a period of the war that I am least familiar with so it took a lot of concentration and a few google searches for background information. Then, thanks to Churchill's outstanding writing, it became completely engrossing. He has a way of describing multiple complex events that are happening simultaneously in a straightforward manner that makes it easy to comprehend. And he includes some insightful reflections that did not often reach the news or common knowledge at the time or since. It appeared that discussions for peace by the allies took more effort and diplomacy than fighting the war did. If you find the subject interesting, this is a terrific work that I'm glad I invested the time spent reading all six volumes.

The Nobel Prize in Literature 1953 was awarded to Sir Winston S. Churchill "for his mastery of historical and biographical description as well as for brilliant oratory in defending exalted human values." It is commonly thought that he received the Literature Prize for his memoir "The Second World War", however, that multi-volume work was unfinished at the time, and not considered.

I've read Dear Committee Members by Julie Schumacher which won the Thurber Prize for American Humor as mentioned by NinieB >22 NinieB:. Thanks, Ninie, this helped immensely for the humor square on this year's BingoDOG card.

>57 sallylou61: I hope you enjoyed it!

>58 NinieB:. I did.

Well, the nature book I pulled from the Jar of Fate for September only went and won this year's Wainwright Prize the day after i finished it! So I'll count it for this month's RandomCAT (I'll still read Life After Life as originally planned too). It was English Pastoral: An Inheritance by James Rebanks, and was excellent, a thoroughly deserved winner. It's about the farm he and his family have farmed for generation, and looking at farming more sustainably and environmentally responsibly.

>60 Jackie_K: Perfect timing!

>60 Jackie_K: that sounds jammy!

I read his earlier book and while it should have worked for me, it just didn't.

>62 Helenliz: Oh, I loved his earlier book! But hey, it would be boring if we all had exactly the same taste in books! :D

I just finished Fly by Night by Frances Hardinge, which won the Branford Boase Award in 2006. This award "wishes to celebrate and encourage . . . the crucial early development of new writing talent."

A Long Way from Chicago by Richard Peck (Newbery)

What a delightful read! This book consists of short stories about two children's summer visits with their grandma in 1930s Illinois, told from the perspective of the older brother. Their grandmother is an original, a non-conformist, and the children learn to love and emulate her.

The local library has the other two books in the series. I've put in a request to borrow them, and plan to enjoy more about these characters this weekend.

The Witch of Blackbird Pond / Elizabeth George Speare
3.25 stars

It’s the 17th century. Katherine (Kit) is from the Caribbean and is now an orphan, so she manages to find passage on a ship to Connecticut, where she has an aunt. Her aunt and uncle (and cousins) take her in, but she has a hard time adjusting to the culture, and to the amount of work she is expected to help with (she is used to having slaves to do the work). She befriends the local elderly woman who lives alone, Hannah. Hannah is a Quaker, and is also considered a witch by the locals and Kit is asked not to visit Hannah, anymore.

I listened to the audio, and mostly I liked it, but it was hard to keep focus, unfortunately. I liked it enough that I often rewound to listen again to try to catch what I’d missed, but I still missed more than I would have liked.

>65 fuzzi:
>66 LibraryCin:

Two of my favorite books!

Although it wasn't the book I orginally had planned to read for this Cat, Over and Under by Todd Tucker, 2009 Alex Award winner, was a very well done coming-of-age story.

I finished The Pioneers by David McCullough (2019), about the settling of the Northwest Territory--specifically Marietta, Ohio on the Ohio River. It won the Ohioana Book Award in 2020. McCullough is always a joy to read because he admires the people he writes about.

>69 kac522: I read this book a couple of months ago and also found it a joy--doubly so because I'm from Ohio.

>69 kac522: - Although I usually find a book suggestion for my husband for Christmas from rabbittprincess for some kind of maritime disaster that she has read about, I think I might switch things up this year and take this as a BB for him.

>70 Tess_W:, >71 dudes22: It's our RL Book Club selection for this month, which we'll be discussing tomorrow. We all enjoy McCullough, so it will be a lovefest! It's also a fairly quick read (under 300 pages).

>71 dudes22: Speaking of maritime disasters, my next book is Lost on the Lady Elgin by Valerie van Heest, about a ship that sank in Lake Michigan in 1860. It was a fundraising recreational cruise event, that sailed from Milwaukee to Chicago and collided with another boat on the return to Milwaukee. I had several ancestors who were on that ship (2 were lost, 1 survived). I bought the book some years ago from the author when she gave a presentation about the wreck. If your spouse is interested in Great Lakes history, I think she still has a website where you can purchase the book directly.

>73 kac522: That sounds interesting! I once took a dinner cruise on Lake Michigan. It was summertime, and the water was still rough once we got out and away from the shore. Not many of us were very interested in dinner at that point.

>74 LadyoftheLodge: Yes, Lake Michigan can be unpredictable, especially in September when the disaster happened. A storm came up in the middle of the night on the return trip, and the collision occurred off the coast of Wilmette. Parts of the ship (and bodies) washed ashore for miles (and days) along the Lake. My ancestor was rescued by a man from Highland Park, where the cabin door she had been clinging to washed ashore.

>73 kac522: - Thanks for the suggestion, but he's more an open ocean kind of guy. Still I'll keep it in mind.

I am reading a couple of large books this month, so I read a short one for this. Casey at the Bat winner of the 2001 Caldecott Honor. The edition I read was not that one but still had great illustrations.

Frère d'âme has won the Goncourt des lycéens in 2018 and the International Man Booker 2021. I found this disappointing and the ending baffling.

Looks like this has won a bunch of YA awards

Fangirl / Rainbow Rowell
3.75 stars

Cath and Wren are twin sisters and going to college. Not only are they leaving their dad, but Wren has insisted they not be roommates so they can meet new people. Which is fine for outgoing, party-girl Wren, but Cath is a shy nerd. A fanfiction writing nerd, obsessed with Simon Snow, the wildly popular fantasy series, and the last book will be coming out soon. Cath’s new roomate Reagan is distant, but Reagan’s boyfriend is far too friendly – with everyone. Mostly Cath leaves him in the hall if Reagan isn’t home (which is most of the time). Cath is excited to start her Creative Fiction course, though – a higher level class she needed permission to get into.

I really enjoyed the main story of Cath and the events surrounding her. For me, there was far too much Simon Snow, though. I skimmed over almost all of the Simon Snow writings in the book. This is what brought my rating down by a quarter star. I did come to quite like Reagan. I loved Luke! There were some serious topics in the book, but it’s still a lighthearted book with humourous bits thrown in.

I have finished Kate Atkinson's Life After Life, which won the Costa Novel award in 2013, and absolutely loved it (review on my thread).

I forgot to report in that I had read Life After Life - I listened to the audiobook, and, like Jackie, I absolutely loved it.

I read a Newberry Honor winner, Hattie Big Sky by Kirby Larson. I was checking it out as a possible Christmas present and it is so good, I'll be buying it for a little girl that loves to read.

I read The Czar's Madman by Jaan Kross, which won the Prix du Meilleur Livre Etranger.