Oscar Wao

Un maldito hombre. More dangerous than comic supervillains and monsters, devious and controlling, and in some cases, as with Rafael Trujillo, "the dictatingest dictator that ever lived," who wrecked the Dominican Republic for generations, stronger than prayer or God. Un maldito hombre is what Oscar Wao, the ghetto supernerd hero of Junot Díaz's much-awaited first novel, is not. That is why his life is brief, and why it is wondrous.

Carrie Arcos was mystified when she received an email from the National Book Foundation instructing her to call its office. "I thought I was in trouble or something," said the Los Angeles mother of three. It turned out to be just the opposite. "Out of Reach," her young adult novel about siblings and meth addiction, had been chosen as a finalist for the National Book Awards. "It's so unbelievable to me that this is happening," said Arcos, a first-time novelist. The finalists for the National Book Awards were announced Wednesday.

Fiction 1. New Moon by Stephenie Meyer ($10.99) 2. Twilight by Stephenie Meyer ($10.99) 3. The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao by Junot Diaz ($14) 4. The Shack by William P. Young ($14.99) 5. White Tiger by Aravind Adiga ($14) Nonfiction 1. Dreams From My Father by Barack Obama ($14.95) 2. The Audacity of Hope by Barack Obama ($7.99) 3. Three Cups of Tea by Greg Mortenson and David Oliver Relin ($15) 4. A New Earth by Eckhart Tolle ($14) 5. Eat, Pray, Love by Elizabeth Gilbert ($15)

On Monday, news of who would be named the 2012 MacArthur Fellows leaked out early in reports by the Associated Press and elsewhere. Two writers are among the 23 artists, scientists and thinkers on the list: Junot Diaz and Dinaw Mengestu. Diaz is the author of, most recently, the short story collection "This Is How You Lose Her," published in September. Mengestu's most recent work is the 2010 novel "How to Read the Air. " Both are published by Riverhead. Each author will receive a no-strings-attached "genius grant" of $500,000.

Writer Junot Diaz has always juggled multiple identities: Born in the Dominican Republic, he grew up part nerd, part playboy in New Jersey. His 1996 book of short stories, "Drown," turned some heads, but it wasn't until his debut novel last year, "The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao," that all those identities beautifully collided to make bestseller gold. Suddenly, it's not only literary nerds who know Diaz's name -- or Oscar Wao's. Diaz will be in town for a free reading from the novel at Westwood's Hammer Museum at 7 p.m. Monday.

On Monday, news of who would be named the 2012 MacArthur Fellows leaked out early in reports by the Associated Press and elsewhere. Two writers are among the 23 artists, scientists and thinkers on the list: Junot Diaz and Dinaw Mengestu. Diaz is the author of, most recently, the short story collection "This Is How You Lose Her," published in September. Mengestu's most recent work is the 2010 novel "How to Read the Air. " Both are published by Riverhead. Each author will receive a no-strings-attached "genius grant" of $500,000.

Carrie Arcos was mystified when she received an email from the National Book Foundation instructing her to call its office. "I thought I was in trouble or something," said the Los Angeles mother of three. It turned out to be just the opposite. "Out of Reach," her young adult novel about siblings and meth addiction, had been chosen as a finalist for the National Book Awards. "It's so unbelievable to me that this is happening," said Arcos, a first-time novelist. The finalists for the National Book Awards were announced Wednesday.

The Pulitzer Prize in fiction, announced Monday, has been awarded to Adam Johnson for his book set in North Korea, "The Orphan Master's Son. " The committee described the book as "an exquisitely crafted novel that carries the reader on an adventuresome journey into the depths of totalitarian North Korea and into the most intimate spaces of the human heart. " Johnson teaches at Stanford; "The Orphan Master's Son" is his third book. Sharon Olds won the poetry award for her collection "Stag's Leap," cited as "a stunningly poignant sequence of poems that tells the story of a divorce, embracing strands of love, sex, sorrow, memory and new freedom.

Fiction 1. Twilight by Stephenie Meyer ($10.99) 2. New Moon by Stephenie Meyer ($10.99) 3. The White Tiger by Aravind Adiga ($14) 4. The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao by Junot Diaz ($14) 5. The Shack by William P. Young ($14.99) Nonfiction 1. The Audacity of Hope by Barack Obama ($7.99) 2. Dreams From My Father by Barack Obama ($14.95) 3. Three Cups of Tea by Greg Mortenson and David Oliver Relin ($15) 4. Eat, Pray, Love by Elizabeth Gilbert ($15) 5. A New Earth by Eckhart Tolle ($14)

Writer Junot Diaz has always juggled multiple identities: Born in the Dominican Republic, he grew up part nerd, part playboy in New Jersey. His 1996 book of short stories, "Drown," turned some heads, but it wasn't until his debut novel last year, "The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao," that all those identities beautifully collided to make bestseller gold. Suddenly, it's not only literary nerds who know Diaz's name -- or Oscar Wao's. Diaz will be in town for a free reading from the novel at Westwood's Hammer Museum at 7 p.m. Monday.

Junot Díaz's "The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao" seems poised to be the hottest debut novel of the year. Arriving after 11 years of expectation following Díaz's celebrated story collection "Drown," the novel's narrative voice evokes both the polyglot energy of Salman Rushdie's "Midnight's Children" and the sexual longing (and New Jersey setting) of Philip Roth's "Portnoy's Complaint." But in some crucial ways Oscar, the novel's hapless protagonist, is the opposite of the horn dog Portnoy.

Un maldito hombre. More dangerous than comic supervillains and monsters, devious and controlling, and in some cases, as with Rafael Trujillo, "the dictatingest dictator that ever lived," who wrecked the Dominican Republic for generations, stronger than prayer or God. Un maldito hombre is what Oscar Wao, the ghetto supernerd hero of Junot Díaz's much-awaited first novel, is not. That is why his life is brief, and why it is wondrous.

Junot Díaz's "The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao" seems poised to be the hottest debut novel of the year. Arriving after 11 years of expectation following Díaz's celebrated story collection "Drown," the novel's narrative voice evokes both the polyglot energy of Salman Rushdie's "Midnight's Children" and the sexual longing (and New Jersey setting) of Philip Roth's "Portnoy's Complaint." But in some crucial ways Oscar, the novel's hapless protagonist, is the opposite of the horn dog Portnoy.