NBS recommends award-winning titles

The BRIEF WONDROUS LIFE OF OSCAR WAO

By Junot Díaz

Pulitzer Prize 2008

Things have never been easy for Oscar, a sweet but disastrously overweight, lovesick Dominican ghetto nerd. From his home in New Jersey, where he lives with his old-world mother and rebellious sister, Oscar dreams of becoming the Dominican J.R.R. Tolkien and, most of all, of finding love. But he may never get what he wants, thanks to the Fukœ-the curse that has haunted Oscar’s family for generations, dooming them to prison, torture, tragic accidents, and, above all, ill-starred love. Oscar, still waiting for his first kiss, is just its most recent victim.

THE WHITE TIGER

By Aravind Adiga

Man Booker Prize 2008

Balram Halwai is a complicated man. Servant. Philosopher. Entrepreneur. Murderer. Over the course of seven nights, Balram tell us the terrible and transfixing story of how he came to be a success in life — having nothing but his own wits to help him along. And with a charisma as undeniable as it is unexpected, Balram teaches us that religion doesn’t create virtue, and money doesn’t solve every problem — but decency can still be found in a corrupt world, and you can get what you want out of life if you eavesdrop on the right conversations.

WANDERING STAR

By J.M.G. Le Clézio (2008 Nobel Prize Winner for Literature)

Translated by C. Dickson

Wandering Star tells two discrete stories of two young girls, one Jewish and one Palestinian, who meet once briefly by chance. Their stories are connected by substance, rather than plot. Each is a wandering star in search of a homeland — Esther escaping the Nazi Holocaust, and Nejma, who experiences the horrors of life in the camps. Yet through this novel of dark times and human suffering, affirmation shines as the characters encounter the beauty of nature and instances of human kindness and love.

THE STORY OF EDGAR SAWTELLE

By David Wroblewski

2007 Oprah Book Club Selection

Born mute, speaking only in sign, Edgar Sawtelle leads an idyllic life with his parents on their farm in remote northern Wisconsin. For generations, the Sawtelles have raised and trained a fictional breed of dog whose thoughtful companionship is epitomized by Almondine, Edgar’s lifelong friend and ally. But with the unexpected return of Claude, Edgar’s paternal uncle, turmoil consumes the Sawtelles’ once peaceful home. When Edgar’s father dies suddenly, Claude insinuates himself into their life on the farm — and into Edgar’s mother’s affections.

Grief-stricken and bewildered, Edgar tries to prove Claude played a role in his father’s death, but his plan backfires spectacularly. Forced to flee into the vast wilderness lying beyond the farm, Edgar comes of age in the wild, fighting for his survival and that of the three yearling dogs who follow him. But his need to face his father’s murderer and his devotion to the Sawtelle dogs turn Edgar homeward.

MGA GERILYA SA POWELL STREET

By Benjamin Pimentel

National Book Award for Best Novel

Mga Gerilya sa Powell Street is a funny and heartrending narration of a group of Filipino veterans of the Pacific War who are habitués of San Francisco’s Powell Street, and are forever waiting for the full equity benefits they have lobbied for years in the US Congress. Although the novel’s characters are depicted in a comic, sometimes hilarious, way, the underlying seriousness of the book is brought to light: of strangers in a strange land, fighting another war of discontent, disillusions and disappointments.