The US National Book Critics Circle announced its 2025 award finalists on Tuesday, January 20, 2026. Here are the writers of African descent who made the cut.
Since 1974, the National Book Critics Circle (NBCC) has honored the best books published in English in the United States across six categories: Fiction, Nonfiction, Biography, Autobiography, Poetry, and Criticism. Finalists are nominated and selected by a 24-member jury comprised of critics and editors from the nation’s leading print and online publications. Previous winners include Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie (2013), Nicole R. Fleetwood, francine j. harris, Raven Leilani (2020), Safiya Sinclair and Jonny Steinberg (2023). Hisham Matar and Hanif Abdurraqib won in their categories in 2024.
The 2025 longlists were announced by the organisation starting on Monday, December 15, before the finalists were revealed on Tuesday.
“The NBCC is delighted to announce our 2025 shortlists. Out of the many hundreds of titles that our organization carefully considered this year, these singular and striking finalists rose to the top,” said NBCC President Adam Dalva. “Each of these books is an artistic achievement. They interrogate the lives we lead, broaden our creative and social horizons, move us, and continually surprise us. Especially in this difficult time, every one of these writers and translators deserves to be celebrated – and to be widely read.”
The writers of African descent from the 42 shortlisted books published by 30 different presses/imprints named as finalists are:
Fiction
- The Wilderness, Angela Flournoy, Mariner Books / HarperCollins Publishers
Criticism
- One Day, Everyone Will Have Always Been Against This, by Omar El Akkad (Knopf)
Poetry
- Death of the First Idea, by Rickey Laurentiis (Knopf)
- Night Watch, by Kevin Young (Knopf)
- Unravel, by Tolu Oloruntoba (McClelland & Stewart)
Biography
- Queen Mother: Black Nationalism, Reparations, and the Untold Story of Audley Moore, by Ashley D. Farmer (Pantheon)
The winners will be revealed in a ceremony on March 26, 2026.
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