60th anniversary of the National Book Award

On July 7, the National Book Foundation launched a new campaign celebrating the 60th anniversary of the National Book Awards that will culminate in a vote by the public this fall to choose the Best of the National Book Awards Fiction. To spread the word, and to highlight past winners, the National Book Foundation has created a book-a-day blog, featuring all of the fiction winners from 1950 to 2008. Visit their website,www.nationalbook.org, to cast your vote. Members of the public who cast their votes (one vote per e-mail address) will have a chance to win two tickets to the November 18, 2009 National Book Awards Ceremony and Dinner and a two-night stay at the Marriott Hotel near Wall Street in New York City. Whether you vote or not, you should check out this website and the daily blogs. They have laid out, or will lay out over the next couple of months, a handy little trail of literary history with synopses, critique, and authors' comments. The Foundation will create a shortlist for the public's review on September 21 and solicit your votes on that. Have fun with it.