The nominees for the 2008 Borders Original Voices Awards, which recognize "fresh, compelling and ambitious works from the new and emerging talents," have been selected by the bookseller's corporate and store employees. A committee of corporate staff members will select the winners in each of the four categories. Winners receive $5,000, and their books will be featured in Borders's superstores.
The nominees:
Fiction
- Dear American Airlines by Jonathan Miles (Houghton Mifflin)
- The Cellist of Sarajevo by Steven Galloway (Riverhead)
- The Good Thief by Hannah Tinti (Dial Press)
- The Lace Reader by Brunonia Barry (Morrow)
- The Somnambulist by Jonathan Barnes (Morrow)
- The White Tiger by Aravind Adiga (Free Press)
Nonfiction
- The Alchemy of Air: A Jewish Genius, a Doomed Tycoon, and the Scientific Discovery That Fed the World but Fueled the Rise of Hitler by Thomas Hager (Harmony)
- The Fortune Cookie Chronicles: Adventures in the World of Chinese Food by Jennifer 8 Lee (Twelve)
- The Geography of Bliss: One Grump's Search for the Happiest Places in the World by Eric Weiner (Twelve)
- The House at Sugar Beach: In Search of a Lost African Childhood by Helene Cooper (Simon & Schuster)
- The Suspicions of Mr. Whicher: A Shocking Murder and the Undoing of a Great Victorian Detective by Kate Summerscale (Walker)
- We Bought a Zoo: The Amazing True Story of a Young Family, a Broken Down Zoo, and the 200 Wild Animals That Change Their Lives Forever by Benjamin Mee (Weinstein Books)
Young Adult/Independent Reader
- Heck: Where the Bad Kids Go by Dale Basye (Random House Books for Young Readers)
- I Am Apache by Tanya Landman (Candlewick)
- The Patron Saint of Butterflies by Cecilia Galante (Bloomsbury USA Children's Books)
- Tunnels by Roderick Gordon and Brian Williams (Chicken House)
- Tweak: Growing Up on Methamphetamines by Nic Sheff (Ginee Seo Books)
- Wake by Lisa McMann (Simon Pulse)
Children's Picture Books
- Do You Do a Didgeridoo? written by Nick Page and illustrated by Sara Baker (Make Believe Ideas)
- Ladybug Girl written by Jacky Davis and illustrated by David Soman (Dial)
- Little Bunny Kung Fu written and illustrated by Regan Johnson (Blooming Tree Press)
- Those Darn Squirrels! written by Adam Rubin and illustrated by Daniel Salmieri (Clarion Books)
- Wave written and illustrated by Suzy Lee (Chronicle Books)
- What's Under the Bed? written and illustrated by Joe Fenton (Simon & Schuster Children's Publishing)