Look. We know how it’s going to go down. By this time tomorrow, Oscar nominees will be announced and madness will ensue. There will be the campaigning amongst friends. The mad dash to see the films you haven’t seen. The endless questioning about who should win, who shouldn’t win and who should never be allowed to direct again. In certain circles, the mad “What will they wear? Who will they wear?”debating will also begin. You know how it goes, you do it every year. We do it too.

So. In an attempt to fill our minds with something less Hollywood but still award-y this awards season, we bring you the National Book Critics Circle nominees:

Fiction
- Half of a Yellow Sun by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie
- The Inheritance of Loss by Kiran Desai
- What is the What by Dave Eggers
- The Lay of the Land by Richard Ford
- The Road by Cormac McCarthy

Nonfiction
- The Occupation: War and Resistance in Iraq by Patrick Cockburn
- The Girls Who Went Away: The Hidden History of Women Who Surrendered Children for Adoption in the Decades Before Roe V. Wade by Anne Fessler
- The Omnivore's Dilemma: A Natural History of Four Meals by Michael Pollan
- Rough Crossings: Britain, the Slaves and the American Revolution by Simon Schama
- The Lemon Tree: An Arab, a Jew and the Heart of the Middle East by Sandy Tolan

Winners will be announced on March 8th. Visit the NBCC for the full list. Have you read any of these? If so, what do you think of the nominees?

If you haven't: Go on. Read a book. You can argue about the merits of Oscar between chapters.

Photo by grebo guru via Flickr