National Book Award Watch Party

Do you love book awards? Are you tired of going to your favorite pub every November to watch the “NBAs,” only for the bartender to turn the TV to basketball?

Join us in community and be the first to know this year’s National Book Award winners! We’re livestreaming the 76th Annual National Book Awards at our Ravenna neighborhood store on November 19th, starting at 5pm Pacific. The livestream lasts until 8pm, but all are welcome to come and go as they please. This year’s ceremony will be hosted by actor Jeff Hiller, with musical guest Corinne Bailey Rae.

Brush up on the finalists here and let us know you’re coming at the RSVP link below.

Your 2025 National Book Award finalists!

Fiction

• Rabih Alameddine, “The True True Story of Raja the Gullible (and His Mother)”
• Megha Majumdar, “A Guardian and a Thief”
• Karen Russell, “The Antidote”
• Ethan Rutherford, “North Sun: Or, the Voyage of the Whaleship Esther”
• Bryan Washington, “Palaver”

Nonfiction

• Omar El Akkad, “One Day, Everyone Will Have Always Been Against This”
• Julia Ioffe, “Motherland: A Feminist History of Modern Russia, From Revolution to Autocracy”
• Yiyun Li, “Things in Nature Merely Grow”
• Claudia Rowe, “Wards of the State: The Long Shadow of American Foster Care”
• Jordan Thomas, “When It All Burns: Fighting Fire in a Transformed World”

Poetry

• Gabrielle Calvocoressi, “The New Economy”
• Cathy Linh Che, “Becoming Ghost”
• Tiana Clark, “Scorched Earth”
• Richard Siken, “I Do Know Some Things”
• Patricia Smith, “The Intentions of Thunder: New and Selected Poems”

Translated Literature

• Solvej Balle, “On the Calculation of Volume (Book III)”, translated from the Danish by Sophia Hersi Smith and Jennifer Russell
• Gabriela Cabezón Cámara, “We Are Green and Trembling”, translated from the Spanish by Robin Myers
• Anjet Daanje, “The Remembered Soldier”, translated from the Dutch by David McKay
• Hamid Ismailov, “We Computers: A Ghazal Novel”, translated from the Uzbek by Shelley Fairweather-Vega
• Neige Sinno, “Sad Tiger”, translated from the French by Natasha Lehrer

Young People’s Literature

• Kyle Lukoff, “A World Worth Saving”
• Amber McBride, “The Leaving Room”
• Daniel Nayeri, “The Teacher of Nomad Land: A World War II Story”
• Hannah V. Sawyerr, “Truth Is”
• Ibi Zoboi, “(S)Kin”

About Third Place Books

Founded in 1998 in Lake Forest Park, Washington, Third Place Books is dedicated to the creation of a community around books and the ideas inside them. With locations in Lake Forest Park and Seattle’s Ravenna and Seward Park neighborhoods, Third Place Books is proud to serve the entire Seattle metro area. Learn more about their event series at thirdplacebooks.com/events.