NBCC, ToB, and the Ghetto Burger

Or, BGB plays catch-up with last week’s news…

The National Book Critics Circle Awards were announced last week. The winners were:

• Fiction: The Inheritance of Loss by Kiran Desia
  
• General Non-Fiction: Rough Crossings: Britain, the Slaves and the American Revolution by Simon Schama
• Biography: James Tiptree, Jr.: The Double Life of Alice B. Sheldon by Julie Phillips
• Autobiography: The Lost: A Search for Six of Six Million by Daniel Mendelsohn
• Criticism: Everything That Rises: A Book of Convergences by Lawrence Weschler
• Poetry: Tom Thomson in Purgatory by Troy Jollimore

My thoughts: I’m surprised by Desai’s win. She bested Richard Ford, Dave Eggers, Cormac McCarthy, and Chimanda Ngozi Adichie (more on him her in a minute). I was pulling for Ford and Eggers. The Lost sounds completely heartbreaking. Weschler’s Convergences book sounds amazing. It will be mine.

The Morning News’ Tournament of Books started on Thursday while we were still groggy. Why start on a Thursday? Who knows. Two of the matches are now history. Half of a Yellow Sun by Chimanda Ngozi Adichie defeated Gary Shteyngart’s Absurdistan in Match 1 of Round 1. In Match 2 of the first round, The Echo Maker by Richard Powers lost to Claire Messud’s The Emperor’s Children. In Round two, the brackets steer these two winners to judge Jessa Crispin of Bookslut. She loathes The Emperor’s Childen, so find a chump and bet accordingly.

And in perhaps the most sought after award of all, the “Ghetto Burger” from Anne’s Snack Shop was named the Best Burger in the United States by the Wall Street Journal’s Raymond Sokolov. Also rans, The Vortex and The EARL, make Atlanta the best city in the US to get a burger, says the article. I’ve never stepped up to the Ghetto Burger at Anne’s, but I can vouch for the other two restaurants. Perhaps a field trip is in order…

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  By Kerry, March 11, 2007 @ 11:41 am

  Chimamanda is a she! And her book is brilliant, incidentally.

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  By DJ Cayenne, March 11, 2007 @ 1:14 pm

  Well, that’s embarrassing. I’ve made the correction. Her book seems to be getting some great recognition. I’ll have to check it out.

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  By Dr J, March 11, 2007 @ 9:00 pm

  I lived within walking distance of Ann’s for 4 years and never made it over there. Not that anyone would walk over there. Nor that one could walk home after eating a ghetto burger. But I’m still angry with myself.

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  By DJ Cayenne, March 12, 2007 @ 9:17 am

  Dr J: at a toddler birthday on Sunday, the dad who has been to Ann’s was surrounded by listeners as he described the experience. Dining at Ann’s = instant street cred

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