National Book Award Longlist for Nonfiction Announced

Gretel Ehrlich, who visited the Writers Institute this past March, and Jill Lepore, who came in 2005, are among the finalists for the National Book Award in nonfiction.

Full list here:  http://www.nationalbook.org/nba2013.html

Ehrlich received the nomination for Facing the Wave (2013), a book that she presented here at the Institute. The book is an account of  Ehlich's travels in Japan in the aftermath of the 2011 Tohoku earthquake and tsunami, and the subsequent meltdowns at the Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Power Plant. A student of Japanese poetry for much of her life, Ehrlich felt compelled to return to Japan to bear witness and record the stories of survivors.
More about Ehrlich (with video of her Albany visit): http://www.albany.edu/writers-inst/webpages4/archives/ehrlich_gretel13.html

Jill Lepore visited in September 2005 to discuss her book about a slave uprising in colonial Manhattan, New York Burning.  Her new book is Book of Ages: The Life and Opinions of Jane Franklin, about the personal ordeals of Benjamin Franklin's unschooled sister.

More about Lepore's visit:  http://www.albany.edu/writers-inst/webpages4/archives/lepore_jill.html