NAACP Image Awards Winners and Nominees
The NAACP Image Awards nominates five books in nine categories for Outstanding Literature: Biography/Autobiography, Children, Debut Author, Fiction, Graphic Novel, Instructional, Nonfiction, Poetry, and Youth/Teens
38 Image Award Winning and Nominated Books for 2020
Winner - Biography/Autobiography
More Than Enough: Claiming Space for Who You Are (No Matter What They Say)
by Elaine Welteroth
List Price: $26.00Viking Books (Jun 11, 2019)
Nonfiction, Hardcover, 336 pages
More Info
Nominee - Biography/Autobiography
My Name Is Prince
by Prince Rogers Nelson and Randee St. Nicholas
List Price: $90.00Amistad (Nov 19, 2019)
Nonfiction, Hardcover, 384 pages
More Info
Nominee - Biography/Autobiography
Free Cyntoia: My Search for Redemption in the American Prison System
by Cyntoia Brown-Long
List Price: $26.00Atria Books (Oct 15, 2019)
Nonfiction, Hardcover, 320 pages
More Info
Nominee - Biography/Autobiography
The Beautiful Ones
by Prince Rogers Nelson
List Price: $30.00Spiegel & Grau (Oct 29, 2019)
Nonfiction, Hardcover, 288 pages
More Info
Nominee - Biography/Autobiography
Finding My Voice: My Journey to the West Wing and the Path Forward
by Valerie Jarrett
List Price: $30.00Viking Books (Apr 02, 2019)
Nonfiction, Hardcover, 320 pages
More Info
Winner - Children
Sulwe
by Lupita Nyong’o, Illustrated by Vashti Harrison
- A Top 150 Children’s Book
- 11 Time AALBC.com Bestselling Book!
- Coretta Scott King Award Winning Book 2020
- An NAACP Image Award Honored Book
- 2020 Children’s Africana Book Award Winner or Honoree
Simon & Schuster Books for Young Readers (Oct 15, 2019)
Fiction, Hardcover, 48 pages
Target Age Group: Picture Book
More Info
Read Our Review of Sulwe
Nominee - Children
Ruby Finds a Worry
by Tom Percival
List Price: $17.99Bloomsbury Publishing (Sep 03, 2019)
Fiction, Hardcover, 32 pages
Target Age Group: Picture Book
More Info
Nominee - Children
Hair Love
by Matthew A. Cherry, Illustrated by Vashti Harrison
- A 2025 National Bestselling Book - Juvenile Fiction
- A 2024 National Bestselling Book - Juvenile Fiction
- A 2023 National Bestselling Book - Juvenile Fiction
- A Top 150 Children’s Book
- 1 Time AALBC.com Bestselling Book!
- An NAACP Image Award Honored Book
Kokila (May 14, 2019)
Fiction, Hardcover, 32 pages
Target Age Group: Picture Book
More Info
Read Our Review of Hair Love
Nominee - Children
A Place to Land: Martin Luther King Jr. and the Speech That Inspired a Nation
by Barry Wittenstein, Illustrated by Jerry Pinkney
List Price: $18.99Neal Porter Books (Aug 27, 2019)
Nonfiction, Hardcover, 48 pages
Target Age Group: Picture Book
More Info
Nominee - Children
Parker Looks Up: An Extraordinary Moment
by Parker Curry and Jessica Curry, Illustrated by Brittany Jackson
List Price: $17.99Aladdin Paperbacks (Oct 15, 2019)
Fiction, Hardcover, 40 pages
Target Age Group: Picture Book
More Info
Winner - Debut Author
I Am Dance: Words and Images of the Black Dancer
by Hal Banfield
List Price: $60.00Literary Revolutionary (Jul 21, 2019)
Nonfiction, Hardcover, 100 pages
More Info
Nominee - Debut Author
More Than Pretty: Doing the Soul Work That Uncovers Your True Beauty
by Erica Campbell
List Price: $26.00Howard Books (Sep 24, 2019)
Nonfiction, Hardcover, 240 pages
More Info
Nominee - Debut Author
Such a Fun Age
by Kiley Reid
List Price: $26.00G.P. Putnam’s Sons (Dec 31, 2019)
Fiction, Hardcover, 320 pages
More Info
Nominee - Debut Author
The Farm
by Joanne Ramos
List Price: $27.00Random House (May 07, 2019)
Fiction, Hardcover, 336 pages
More Info
Winner - Fiction
The Revisioners
by Margaret Wilkerson Sexton
List Price: $25.00Counterpoint (Nov 05, 2019)
Fiction, Hardcover, 288 pages
More Info
Nominee - Fiction
The Water Dancer
by Ta-Nehisi Coates
- 4 Time AALBC.com Bestselling Book!
- Selected for 4 Book Clubs’s Reading Lists
- A 2019 Oprah Book Club Selection
- An NAACP Image Award Honored Book
One World (Sep 24, 2019)
Fiction, Hardcover, 432 pages
More Info
Read Our Review of The Water Dancer
Nominee - Fiction
New Daughters of Africa: An International Anthology of Writing by Women of African Descent
by Margaret Busby
- 3 Time AALBC.com Bestselling Book!
- Selected for 1 Book Club’s Reading List
- An NAACP Image Award Honored Book
Amistad (May 07, 2019)
Fiction, Hardcover, 1040 pages
More Info
Nominee - Fiction
Red at the Bone
by Jacqueline Woodson
- 4 Time AALBC.com Bestselling Book!
- Selected for 1 Book Club’s Reading List
- An NAACP Image Award Honored Book
Riverhead Books (Sep 17, 2019)
Fiction, Hardcover, 208 pages
More Info
Read Our Review of Red at the Bone
Nominee - Fiction
Out of Darkness, Shining Light
by Petina Gappah
List Price: $27.00Scribner (Sep 10, 2019)
Fiction, Hardcover, 320 pages
More Info
Winner - Instructional
Your Next Level Life: 7 Rules of Power, Confidence, and Opportunity for Black Women in America
by Karen Arrington
List Price: $14.99Tiny Press (May 15, 2019)
Nonfiction, Paperback, 108 pages
More Info
Nominee - Instructional
More Than Pretty: Doing the Soul Work That Uncovers Your True Beauty
by Erica Campbell
List Price: $26.00Howard Books (Sep 24, 2019)
Nonfiction, Hardcover, 240 pages
More Info
Nominee - Instructional
Letters to the Finishers (who struggle to finish)
by Candace E. Wilkins
List Price: $13.99NewSeason Books (Jun 01, 2019)
Nonfiction, Paperback, 194 pages
More Info
Nominee - Instructional
Vegetables Unleashed: A Cookbook
by Jose Andres and Matt Goulding
List Price: $39.99Anthony Bourdain/Ecco (May 21, 2019)
Nonfiction, Hardcover, 368 pages
More Info
Nominee - Instructional
Inspire Your Home: Easy Affordable Ideas to Make Every Room Glamorous
by Farah Merhi
List Price: $35.00Tiller Press (Oct 22, 2019)
Nonfiction, Hardcover, 304 pages
More Info
Nominee - Nonfiction
What Doesn’t Kill You Makes You Blacker: A Memoir in Essays
by Damon Young
List Price: $27.99Ecco (Mar 26, 2019)
Nonfiction, Hardcover, 320 pages
More Info
Nominee - Nonfiction
The Yellow House: A Memoir
by Sarah M. Broom
- 1 Time AALBC.com Bestselling Book!
- Selected for 1 Book Club’s Reading List
- An NAACP Image Award Honored Book
Grove Press (Aug 13, 2019)
Nonfiction, Hardcover, 304 pages
More Info
Nominee - Nonfiction
Stony the Road: Reconstruction, White Supremacy, and the Rise of Jim Crow
by Henry Louis Gates, Jr.
List Price: $30.00Penguin Press (Apr 02, 2019)
Nonfiction, Hardcover, 320 pages
More Info
Nominee - Nonfiction
Breathe: A Letter to My Sons
by Imani Perry
List Price: $18.00Beacon Press (Sep 17, 2019)
Nonfiction, Hardcover, 176 pages
More Info
Winner - Poetry
Felon: Poems
by Reginald Dwayne Betts
List Price: $26.95W. W. Norton & Company (Oct 15, 2019)
Poetry, Hardcover, 112 pages
More Info
Nominee - Poetry
The Tradition
by Jericho Brown
- A 2025 National Bestselling Book - Poetry
- A 2024 National Bestselling Book - Poetry
- A 2023 National Bestselling Book - Poetry
- 4 Time AALBC.com Bestselling Book!
- An NAACP Image Award Honored Book
Copper Canyon Press (Apr 02, 2019)
Poetry, Paperback, 110 pages
More Info
Nominee - Poetry
Honeyfish
by Lauren K. Alleyne
List Price: $16.00New Issues Poetry & Prose (Apr 15, 2019)
Poetry, Paperback, 57 pages
More Info
Nominee - Poetry
A Bound Woman Is a Dangerous Thing: The Incarceration of African American Women from Harriet Tubman to Sandra Bland
by Damaris B. Hill
List Price: $25.00Bloomsbury Publishing (Jan 15, 2019)
Nonfiction, Hardcover, 192 pages
More Info
Nominee - Poetry
Mistress
by Chet’la Sebree
List Price: $16.00New Issues Poetry & Prose (Oct 15, 2019)
Poetry, Paperback, 80 pages
More Info
Winner - Youth/Teens
Around Harvard Square
by Christopher John Farley
List Price: $14.95Black Sheep (Apr 01, 2019)
Fiction, Paperback, 280 pages
Target Age Group: Young Adult
More Info
Nominee - Youth/Teens
I’m Not Dying with You Tonight
by Gilly Segal and Kimberly Jones
List Price: $17.99Sourcebooks Fire (Aug 06, 2019)
Fiction, Hardcover, 272 pages
Target Age Group: Young Adult
More Info
Nominee - Youth/Teens
The Forgotten Girl
by India Hill Brown
List Price: $16.99Scholastic Press (Nov 05, 2019)
Fiction, Hardcover, 256 pages
Target Age Group: Middle Grade
More Info
Nominee - Youth/Teens
Her Own Two Feet: A Rwandan Girl’s Brave Fight to Walk
by Meredith Davis and Rebeka Uwitonze
List Price: $17.99Scholastic Inc (Oct 01, 2019)
Nonfiction, Hardcover, 208 pages
Target Age Group: Middle Grade
More Info
Nominee - Youth/Teens
Hot Comb
by Ebony Flowers
List Price: $21.95Drawn and Quarterly (Jun 18, 2019)
Fiction, Paperback, 184 pages
Target Age Group: Young Adult
More Info