The Book Prize Index

Ordinary Notes

Christina Sharpe

Ordinary Notes is a book by American academic Christina Sharpe, published in April 2023 by Farrar, Straus and Giroux. The book is a collection of 248 notes about black life in the United States. Ordinary Notes received positive reviews by writers for Kirkus Reviews, The New York Times, and others. It was shortlisted for the 2023 National Book Award for Nonfiction. Sharpe previously published In the Wake: On Blackness and Being in 2016.

Race & EthnicityRace & Ethnicity · medium confidenceRace & Ethnicity81 signalsLlm Classifier: Race & Ethnicity -> Race & EthnicityKeyword Classifier: American History -> American HistoryAward Category: Hilary Weston Writers' Trust Prize for Nonfiction -> Arts & CriticismLiterature & WritersArt, Music & Performance

Award History

1 wins · 4 total

AwardYearResultCategory / Notes
Hilary Weston Writers' Trust Prize for Nonfiction2023WinnerSecondary source
Los Angeles Times Book Prize for Current InterestMajor2023FinalistSecondary source
National Book Award for NonfictionMajor2023FinalistSecondary source
National Book Critics Circle Award for NonfictionMajor2023FinalistSecondary source
View all award history (4)
Experimental book profileGenerated by GPT-5.4 nano · may contain inaccuracies

This is an unverified interpretation of the catalog description, offered as an opt-in discovery experiment—not as bibliographic fact.

  1. 01 Central figures

    None extracted with sufficient confidence.

  2. 02 Central places

    • United States80%

  3. 03 Suggested argument

    No argument inferred with sufficient confidence.

  4. 04 Reading orientation

    55 / 100 academic

    Trade / academic crossover

    An estimate of intended readership and scholarly apparatus—not quality or importance.

Confidence percentages are the model's own estimates. Profile confidence: 78%.