Art Seidenbaum Award For First Fiction THE IDIOT by Elif Batuman (Penguin Books) MY ABSOLUTE DARLING by Gabriel Tallent (Riverhead Books) SOUR HEART by Jenny Zhang (Lenny) Biography GRANT by Ron Chernow (Penguin Press) RICHARD NIXON: THE LIFE by John A. Farrell (Vintage) 2017 Innovator’s Award - Winner WELL-READ BLACK GIRL by Glory Edim (Ballantine Books) 2017 Christopher Isherwood Prize for Autobiographical Prose - Winner THE HUE AND CRY AT OUR HOUSE: A YEAR REMEMBERED by Benjamin Taylor (Penguin Books) Current Interest WE WERE EIGHT YEARS IN POWER: AN AMERICAN TRAGEDY  by Ta-Nehisi Coates (One World) DEMOCRACY IN CHAINS: THE DEEP HISTORY OF THE RADICAL RIGHT'S STEALTH PLAN FOR AMERICA By Nancy MacLean (Viking) THE FAR AWAY BROTHERS: TWO YOUNG MIGRANTS AND THE MAKING OF AN AMERICAN LIFE by Lauren Markham (Crown) Fiction EXIT WEST by Mohsin Hamid (Riverhead Books) THE CHANGELING by Victor LaValle (Spiegel & Grau) GHACHAR GHOCHAR Vivek Shanbhag (Penguin Books)

Mystery / Thriller

THE NIGHT OCEAN by Paul La Farge (Penguin Press) Science & Technology BEHAVE: THE BIOLOGY OF HUMANS AT OUR BEST AND WORST by Robert M. Sapolsky (Penguin Press) LIFE 3.0: BEING HUMAN IN THE AGE OF ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCE by Max Tegmark (Knopf) Young Adult Literature GENUINE FRAUD by E. Lockhart (Delacorte Press)    

Here is an excerpt from the PW article: Five students—strangers to each other—walk into detention at Bayview High: the brain, the beauty, the jock, the criminal, and the outcast. This is the set-up for ONE OF US IS LYING (Delacorte, May), the debut YA novel by Karen M. McManus, which has been on the New York Times bestseller list for five (now six) weeks straight, and currently sits in the #2 spot. And, if the book’s premise sounds familiar, that’s because it purposely echoes the opening notes of the classic 1985 John Hughes movie The Breakfast Club. But many of those initial similarities fade away when McManus’s tale takes a much darker turn, and only four of the five students leave detention alive. Those remaining are obvious suspects, and they all are keeping secrets. “I actually got the idea while I was driving and listening to the radio,” McManus said, noting that she gets lots of ideas that way. “I think there’s something about having half my brain engaged in a mundane task that kind of gives the other half freedom to roam.” During her drive, the song “Don’t You (Forget About Me)” by Simple Minds from The Breakfast Club’s soundtrack came on. “I started thinking it would be fun to write an update of that movie, which I loved, but with some sort of a twist,” she said. “And the phrase ‘The Breakfast Club with murder’ popped into my head and it just stuck there.” She “noodled” on the idea for a while imagining how, and just as importantly, why, you would kill somebody in a classroom. With those questions settled, “the four characters started springing into my mind and just sort of took off from there.” And “took off” is the right phrase to describe ONE OF US IS LYING’s performance thus far. To date the book boasts 120,000 copies in print and rights have been sold into 20 territories. When it comes to puzzling out what the hook for her book has been, McManus has heard feedback that “it’s the characters. In some way it’s maybe helpful to have four of them because almost anybody can connect with someone,” she said. “[Readers] feel that the characters are relatable and appreciate that they are all flawed. The characters all have growth arcs, and go on different types of journeys to end up in a different place from where they started the book. So they feel real.” Krista Marino, executive editor at Delacorte Press, agrees with that assessment. “Something about this book feels very authentic,” she said. “People might pick it up because it seems like it’s Breakfast Club meets Pretty Little Liars, but then you read it, and it’s grounded in the real world. The characters are not flashy Hollywood kids and this is a real situation that could happen.” Beyond character development, Marino lauds what she sees as the book’s other points of appeal. “It’s such an easy, fast read and so compelling in so many different ways,” she said. “It’s easy to talk about and pitch, which is a blessing for publishers, but it exceeds your expectations.” She has received feedback that the cover is very compelling to readers, which, she said, “is nice to hear.” To read the complete PW article, click here.

Witherspoon at Inkwell Management in association with Araminta Whitley and Philippa Milnes-Smith at Lucas Alexander Whitley Ltd. The first book in the series, FAIRY MOM AND ME, will be published on January 2, 2018, and will be edited by Delacorte Press Associate Editor Kelsey Horton. FAIRY MOM AND ME will be simultaneously published in both the U.K. and Canada. “We are so excited to bring Sophie Kinsella’s signature humor and heartwarming stories to a younger audience for the first time,” Ms. Horowitz said. “FAIRY MOM AND ME has all the ingredients for a magical reading experience for young book lovers and their families, and we are happy to have the opportunity to introduce Sophie to them.” “As a mother of five, I’ve always told stories to children,” Ms. Kinsella said. “I invented Fairy Mom, Ella, and the Computawand for my youngest two children, and now I’m thrilled that they will find a wider audience. Marta Kissi’s illustrations bring the stories to life perfectly with tremendous wit and charm. I think the publication will be a lot of fun. I can’t wait!” FAIRY MOM AND ME tells the story of Ella and her family’s special secret: Ella’s mom is a fairy! With the help of her new-tech wand (dubbed Computawand), she can cast amazing spells to make delicious cupcakes, create the perfect birthday, party, and cause chaos at the supermarket. But sometimes the spells go wrong, and that’s when Ella, the fairy-in-waiting, must assist to return everything to normal. Family, friendship, and magic abound in this sweet and funny debut chapter book, complete with illustrations by Marta Kissi.

Children’s Books has already licensed rights in the United Kingdom to Hot Key Books and in Australia and New Zealand to Allen & Unwin; both will publish Lockhart’s GENUINE FRAUD immediately following the U.S. publication. GENUINE FRAUD will carry a first printing of 250,000 copies and release on September 5, 2017. “It is always cause for celebration when a new E. Lockhart book arrives,” says Ms. Horowitz. “With GENUINE FRAUD Lockhart brilliantly combines a unique structure with the raw emotions of fascinating characters into a subversive psychological suspense novel readers will be hard-pressed to put down—and will want to read again as soon as they finish.” Edgy and inventive, GENUINE FRAUD is an instantly memorable story of love, betrayal, and entangled relationships that are not what they seem. Lockhart introduces readers to the story of Imogen and Jule—Imogen, a runaway heiress, an orphan, a cook, and a cheat; Jule, a fighter, a social chameleon, and an athlete. This is a novel about intense friendship, a disappearance, murder, bad romance, a girl who refuses to give people what they want from her, and a girl who refuses to be the person she once was. Who is genuine? And who is a fraud? You be the judge. Follow #GenuineFraud for conversation about the book. In May 2017, Delacorte Press will publish a special deluxe edition of Lockhart’s bestseller WE WERE LIARS, originally published in 2014 and hailed as “haunting” (Wall Street Journal), “mindblowing” (MTV News), and “shocking” (Entertainment Weekly), now with more than half a million copies sold in all formats in North America and legions of fans around the world. The new keepsake edition will include 32 pages of exclusive content that shares never-before-seen letters written to the main character, Cady, by Gat; the original book proposal; the author’s drawings of Beechwood Island and the Sinclair family tree; an excerpt of Genuine Fraud; and more. The book will retail for $18.99 and will be available wherever books are sold on May 23. WE WERE LIARS spent 50 weeks on the New York Times bestseller list (for both hardcover and eBook editions). Follow the latest discussions about the book using #WeWereLiars.

Titled ZAYN, the artist’s only official book will share a photographic journey of his life, presenting a collection of thoughts, inspirations, personal stories, notes and drawings, and never-before-seen personal photographs.

Within the first few pages, Zayn reveals the impetus behind publishing his first book: “I’m going to show you as much as I can so that you can judge me on my own terms, not on what the press or anyone else says.”

From a normal childhood in Bradford to the unprecedented fame of One Direction and solo superstardom, this beautifully illustrated book encapsulates his outlook on life: his inspirations, experiences and his candid thoughts on fame, success and music.