Nominations
Nominations for the 2026-27 common book are open! The theme for next year is:
- Books for a Next-Gen K-State: inspiring learning, creativity, discovery and engagement that positively impacts society and transforms lives in Kansas and around the world.
Past Nominations:
Nominations for 2025
Americanah - Chimanda Ngozi Adichie
Gaza Writes Back: Short Stories from Young Writers in Gaza, Palestine - Refaat Aleer
First Gen - Alejandra Campoverdi
Braving the Wilderness - Brene Brown
Just Mercy - Bryan Stevenson
Between the World and Me - Ta-NehisiCoates
American Dirt - Jeanine Cummins
The Girl with the Louding Voice - Abi Dare
The Measure - Nikki Erlick
Driving the Green Book: A Road Trip Through the Living History of Black Resistance - Alvin Hall
Exit West - Mohscin Hamid
Being Heumann: An Unrepentant Memoir of a Disability Rights Activist - Judith Heumann
Eleanor Oliphant is Completely Fine - Gail Honeyman
March: Book One John Lewis - Andrew Aydin
Klara and the Sun - Kazuo Ishiguro
You are Changing the World: Whether You Like it or Not - David LaMotte
The Cancelling of the American Mind - Greg Lukianoff
The Stars Beneath Our Feet - David Barclay Moore
News from Nowhere - William Morris
How High We Go In The Dark - Sequoia Nagamatsu
Our Missing Hearts - Celeste Ng
The Berry Pickers - Amanda Peters
How to Stand up to a Dictator - Maria Ressa
The Gift of Perspective - Roy Lindsey
Milkweed - Jerry Spineli
Dear Martin - Nic Stone
Educated: A Memoir - Tara Westover
Sitting Pretty: The View from My Ordinary Resilient Disabled Body - Rebekah Taussig
Slaughterhouse-Five: The Graphic Novel - Kurt Vonnegut
The Martian - Weir Andy
The Underground Railroad - Colson Whitehead
Now is Not the Time To Panic - Kevin Wilson
Nominations for 2024
A Man Called Ove - Fredrik Backman
The Belles - Dhonielle Clayton
How You Say It: Why We Judge Others by the Way They Talk—and the Costs of This Hidden Bias - Katherine Kinzler
Deaf Utopia: A Memoir―and a Love Letter to a Way of Life - Nyle DiMarco and Robert Siebert
Disability Visibility: First-Person Stories from the Twenty-First Century - Alice Wong
What the Eyes Don't See: A Story of Crisis, Resistance, and Hope in an American City - Mona Hanna-Attisha
On the Line: Two Women's Epic Fight to Build a Union - Daisy Pitkin
Saving Us: A Climate Scientist's Case for Hope and Healing in a Divided World - Katharine Hayhoe
The Good Food Revolution: Growing Healthy Food, People, and Communities - Will Allen
Good Arguements - Bo Seo
Solito Javier - Zamora
The Boy, The Mole, The Fox and The Horse - Charlie Mackesy
Radical Inclusion: Seven Steps to Help You Create a More Just Workplace, Home and World - David Moinina Sengeh
Coyote America: A Natural and Supernatural History - Dan Flores
Long Way Down - Jason Reynolds
A Long Walk To Water - Linda Sue Park
The Humans - Matt Haig
Milk and Honey - Rupi Kaur
Lore Olympus: Volume One - Rachel Smythe- Persephone
The Comfort Crisis - Michael Easter
Long Way Down - Jason Reynolds
I Am Strong: The Life and Journey of an Autistic Pastor - Lamar Hardwick
Mario Barradas and Son Jarocho: The Journey of a Mexican Regional Music - Yolanda Broyles-González
John Lewis: Making Good Trouble - Amanda Jackson Green
Sisters of the Lost Nation - Nick Medina
Station Eleven - Emily St. John Mandel
The Measure - Nikki Erlick
Nominations for 2023
Dear America: Notes of an Undocumented Citizen - Jose Antonio Vargas
The Summer We Got Free - Mia McKenzie
Lot: Stories - Bryan Washington
Jonny Appleseed - Joshua Whitehead
The Sweetness of Water - Nathan Harris
Fruit of the Drunken Tree - Ingrid Rojas Contreras
Guapa - Saleem Haddad
Melissa (previously published as GEORGE) - Alex Gino
A Different Kind of Daughter: The Girl Who Hid from the Taliban in Plain Sight - Maria Toorpakai with Katherine Holstein
The Inconvenient Indian: A Curious Account of Native People in North America - Thomas King
Melissa (previously published as GEORGE) - Alex Gino
We Are Not From Here - Jenny Torres Sanchez
A Different Kind of Daughter: The Girl Who Hid from the Taliban in Plain Sight - Maria Toorpakai with Katherine Holstein
Hunger- Roxane Gay
Shrill - Lindy West
Persepolis: The Story of a Childhood - Marjane Satrapi
Acts of Faith: The Story of an American Muslim, the Struggle for the Soul of a Generation - Eboo Patel
Being Heumann - Judith Heumann & Kristen Joiner
The United States Constitution: A Graphic Adaptation - Jonathan Hennessey
Maus I & II - Art Spiegelman
Disability Visibility: First-Person Stories from the Twenty-First Century - Alice Wong
Listening Is an Act of Love - Dave Isay
Letter to a Young Female Physician: Thoughts on Life and Work - Suzanne Koven
Braiding Sweetgrass: Indigenous Wisdom, Scientific Knowledge, and the Teachings of Plants - Robin Wall Kimmerer
All Boys Aren't Blue: A Memoir-Manifesto - George M. Johnson
This Land is My Land: A Graphic History of Big Dreams, Micronations, and Other Self-Made States - Andy Warner
Credo: The Rose Wilder Lane Story - Peter Bagge
Queer: A Graphic History - Meg-JohnBarker
They Called Us Enemy - George Takei
Educated: A Memoir - Tara Westover
Mind and Matter: A Life in Math and Football -John Urschel
Broad Band: The Untold Story of the Women Who Made the Internet - Claire L. Evans
Lab Girl - Hope Jahren
Free: A Child and a Country at the End of History - Lea Ypi
The Lives of Campus Custodians - Insights Into Corporatization and Civic Disengagement in the Academy - Peter Magolda
This Is How It Always Is - Laurie Frankel
Know My Name - Chanel Miller
Born A Crime; Stories from a South African Childhood - Trevor Noah
Last Summer on State Street - Toya Wolfe
Good Kings Bad Kings - Susan Nussbaum
Boys and Oil: Growing Up Gay in a Fractured Land - Taylor Brorby
Son of Elsewhere: A Memoir in Pieces -Elamin Abdelmahmoud
Braiding Sweetgrass -Robin Wall Kimmerer
Kindred - Octavia Butler
Q & A - Vikas Swarup
Butterfly - From Refugee to Olympian - Yusra Mardini
Homegoing - Yaa Gyasi
City of Veils - Zoe Ferraris
Between the World and Me - Ta-Nehisi Coates
On Earth We're Briefly Gorgeous - Ocean Vuong
Factfulness: Ten Reasons We're Wrong About the World--and Why Things Are Better Than You Think - Hans Rosling
Nominations for 2022
The Anthropocene Reviewed: Essays on a Human-Centered Planet - John Green
The Reckonings - Lacy M. Johnson
The Stakes is High - Mychal Denzel Smith
Radium Girls - Kate Moore
Redefining Normal - Justin & Alexis Black
How to Pronounce Knife: Stories - Souvankham Thammavongsa
Tasting the Sky: A Palestinian Childhood - Ibtisam Barakat
Balcony on the Moon: Coming of Age in Palestine - Ibtisam Barakat
Just Mercy - Bryan Stevenson
Make your bed: little things can change your life...and maybe the world - Admiral William H McRaven
The subtle art of not giving a F*ck - Mark Manson
The Power of Human - Adam Waytz
Friendship - Lydia Denworth
Team Human - Douglas Rushkoff
Punching the Air - Ibi Zoboi and Yusef Salaam
Refugee - Alan Gratz
Loonshots: How to Nurture the Crazy Ideas That Win Wars, Cure Diseases, and Transform Industries - Safi Bahcall
Chasing Excellence - Pat Melgares
The Bystander Effect - Catherine Sanderson
We Art Not From Here - Jenny Torres Sanchez
Clap When You Land - Elizabeth Acevedo
The Coddling of the American Mind: How Good Intentions and Bad Ideas Are Setting Up a Generation for Failure - Greg Lukianoff and Jonathan Haidt
Minor Feelings: An Asian American Reckoning - Cathy Park Hong
The Vanishing Half- Brit Bennett
Hood Feminism: Notes From the Women That A Movement Forgot - Mikki Kendall
I Am a Girl from Africa - Elizabeth Nyamayaro
The Perfectionists: How Precision Engineers Created the Modern World - Simon Winchester
Destroy Your Student Loan Debt: The Step-by-Step Plan to Pay Off Your Student Loans Faster - Anthony ONeal
Who Killed Berta Cáceres? - Nina Lakhani
Inconspicuous Consumption - Tatiana Schlossberg
Polluted Promises - Melissa Checker
Braiding Sweetgrass - Robin Wall Kimmerer
Emergent Strategy - adrienne maree brown
Drawdown - Paul Hawken and Tom Steyer
The Sum of Us: What Racism Costs Everyone and How We Can Prosper Together - Heather McGhee
Nominations for 2021
Tuesdays with Morrie - Mitch Albom
The Racial Healing Handbook - Anneliese A. Singh
The Mothers - Britt Bennett
Cuz: The Life and Times of Michael A. - Danielle Allen
The Dew Breaker - Edwidge Danticat
Heartland: A Memoir of Working Hard and Being Broke in the Richest Country on Earth - Sarah Smarsh
And It Begins Like This - LaTanya McQueen
The Marrow Thieves - Cherie Dimaline
There There - Tommy Orange
Friendship- Lydia Denworth
The Power of Human - Adam Waytz
Team Human - Douglas Rushkoff
The Rosie Project - Graeme Simsion
Tribe: On Homecoming and Belonging - Sebastian Junger
Love Thy Neighbor: A Muslim Doctor's Struggle for Home in Rural America - Ayaz Virji
Talking to Strangers - Malcolm Gladwell
Born a Crime - Trevor Noah
An Absolutely Remarkable Thing - Hank Green
World War Z - Max Brooks
The Sound of Waves - Yukio Mishima; Translated by Meredith Weatherby
Beartown - Fredrik Backman
Station Eleven - Emily St. John Mandel
Where Late the Sweet Birds Sang - Kate Wilhelm
Wool - Hugh Howey
This Book is Not Yet Rated - Peter Bognanni
The Day the World Came to Town - Jim DeFede
Flight Behavior - Barbara Kingsolver
Outcasts United: An American Town, a Refugee Team, and One Woman's Quest to Make a Difference - Warren St. John
We Fed an Island: The True Story of Rebuilding Puerto Rico, One Meal at a Time - Jose Andres
The Nightingale - Kristin Hannah
Nominations for 2020
Semiosis - Sue Burke
The Lady and Her Monsters: A Tale of Dissections, Real-Life Dr. Frankensteins, and the Creation of Mary Shelley's Masterpiece - Roseanne Montillo
The Imitation Game: Alan Turing Decoded - Jim Ottaviani, illustrated by Leland Purvis
Trinity: A Graphic History of the First Atomic Bomb - Jonathan Fetter-Vorm
High Price - Carl Hart
The Optimist's Telescope - Bina Venkataraman
Memory of Water - Emmi Itäranta
The Water Knife - Paolo Bacigalupi
Just for Fun: The Story of an Accidental Revolutionary - Linus Torvalds and David Diamond
Energy for Future Presidents: The Science Behind the Headlines - Richard A. Muller
Educated - Tara Westover
The Unwinding of the Miracle - Julie Yip-Williams
Breaking Night - Liz Murray
How to Bake Pi: An edible exploration of mathematics -Eugenia Cheng, Ph.D.
A Country Doctor - Sarah Orne Jewett
The Book of Lights - Chaim Potok
The Radium Girls - Kate Moore
Code Girls: The Untold Story of the American Women Code Breakers of World War II - Liza Mundy
My Brief History - Hawking, Stephen
Songs of the Gorilla Nation: My Journey Through Autism - Dawn Prince-Hughes Ph.D.
Struck by Genius: How a Brain Injury Made Me a Mathematical Marvel - Jason Padgett
Chasing Space: An Astronaut's Story of Grit, Grace, and Second Chances - Leland Melvin
Flight Of The Gin Fizz: Midlife At 4,500 Feet - Henry Kisor
Fallout - Jim Ottaviani, Janine Johnston, Steve Lieber, Vince Locke, Bernie Mireault and Jeff Parker
The Andromeda Strain - Michael Crichton
Losers in Space - John Barnes
Wool - Hugh Howey
The Thrilling Adventures of Lovelace and Babbage: The (Mostly) True Story of the First Computer - Sydney Padua
Hidden Figures - Margot Lee Shetterly
Stiff: The Curious Lives of Human Cadavers - Mary Roach
The Good Food Revolution - Will Allen
The Mercury 13: The Untold Story of Thirteen American Women and the Dream of Space Flight - Martha Ackmann
Flu: The Story Of The Great Influenza Pandemic Of 1918 And The Search For The Virus That Caused It - Gina Kolata
Spaceman: An Astronaut's Unlikely Journey to Unlock the Secrets of the Universe - Mike Massimino
The Science Education of American Girls - Kim Tolley
Alan Turing: The Enigma - Andrew Hodges
The Boy Who Harnessed the Wind - William Kamkwamba and Bryan Mealer
Autonomous - Annalee Newitz
The Martian - Andy Weir
Lab Girl - Hope Jahren
The Housekeeper and the Professor - Yoko Ogawa
An Abundance of Katherines - John Green
The Three Body Problem - Cixin Liu
Nominations for 2019
Butterfly: From Refugee to Olympian - My Story of Rescue, Hope, and Triumph - Yusra Mardini
How to Disappear - Sharon Huss Roat
Good Self, Bad Self: Transforming Your Worst Qualities into Your Biggest Assets - Judy Smith
Super Better: A Revolutionary Approach to Getting Stronger, Happier, Braver and More Resilient--Powered by the Science of Games - Jane McGonigal
Habit Stacking: 127 Small Changes to Improve Your Health, Wealth, and Happiness - S.J. Scott
Win No Matter What: A Guide to Hyping Up Your Life - Nihar Suthar
It's Kind of a Funny Story - Ned Vizzini
I am the Messenger -Marcus Zusak
We Need to Talk: How to Have Conversations That Matter - Celeste Headlee
Reclaiming Conversation The Power of Talk in a Digital Age - Sherry Turkle
The Last Lecture - Randy Pausch
Percy Jackson and the lightning thief - Rick Riordan
The Immortalists - Chloe Benjamin
The Circle - Dave Eggers
Autonomous - Annalee Newitz
The Radium Girls - Kate Moore
The Journey - Kaneil Harrison
Furiously Happy - Jenny Lawson
The Glass Castle - Jeannette Walls
I Am Not Your Perfect Mexican Daughter - Erika L. Sánchez
Turtles All the Way Down - John Green
Mindsight: The New Science of Personal Transformation - Daniel Siegel
Failing Up: How to Take Risks, Aim Higher, and Never Stop Learning - Leslie Odom Jr.
Buddha's Brain: The Practical Neuroscience of Happiness, Love, and Wisdom - Rick Hanson
The Happiness Trap: How to Stop Struggling and Start Living - Russ Harris
The Martian - Andy Weir
Ready, Player One -Ernest Cline
When Breath Becomes Air - Paul Kalanithi
Wonder - R. J. Palacio
10% Happier - Dan Harris
Brain on Fire: My Month of Madness - Susannah Cahalan
War Against the Animals - Paul Russell
Grit: The Power of Passion and Perseverance - Angela Duckworth
The Power of Habit: Why We Do What We Do in Life and Business - Charles Duhigg
Walden on Wheels - Ken Ilgunas
Ode to Kirihito - Osamu Tezuka
I Am Not Your Perfect Mexican Daughter - Erika L. Sánchez
Darius the Great Is Not Okay - Adib Khorram
Butterfly - Yusra Mardini
Hillbilly Elegy – JD Vance
Vox - Christina Dalcher
Turtles All the Way Down - John Green
Beartown - Fredrik Backman
Homegoing - Yaa Gyasi
Grit - Angela Duckworth
Hamilton: An American Musical
Nominations for 2018
Code Talker: The first and only memoir by one of the original Navajo code talkers of WWII - Chester Nez with Judith Schiess Avila
Anti-Intellectualism in American Life - Richard Hofstadter
The 9/11 Report: A Graphic Adaptation - Sid Jacobson and Ernie Colón
American Boys - Jason Reynolds, Brendan Kiely
Ragtime - E.L. Doctorow
Inside Out & Back Again - Thanhha Lai
Autobiography of a Recovering Skinhead: The Frank Meeink Story - Frank Meeink
The Handmaid's Tale - Margaret Atwood
Lab Girl - Hope Jahren
Our Daily Bread; The Essential Norman Borlaug - Noel Vietmeyer
The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier & Clay - Michael Chabon
Gaining Ground: A Story of Farmers' Markets, Local Food, and Saving the Family Farm - Forrest Pritchard
Colored People - Henry Louis Gates, Jr.
The Boys in the Boat - Daniel James Brown
In Order to Live: A North Korean Girl's Journey to Freedom - Yeonmi Park
Exit West - Mohsin Hamid
Natural Born Heroes: Mastering the Lost Secrets of Strength and Endurance - Christopher McDougall
Americanah - Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie
Twelve Steps to a Compassionate Life - Karen Armstrong
Born A Crime - Trevor Noah
The Great Gatsby - F. Scott Fitzgerald
Rocket Boys - Homer Hickman
How the Garcia Girls Lost Their Accent - Julia Alvarez
The Mothers - Brit Bennett
Behold the Dreamers: A Novel - Imbolo Mbue
The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier & Clay - Michael Chabon
The Midnight Man - David Eric Tomlinson
The Book of Unknown Americans - Cristina Henríquez
The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian - Sherman Alexie
Middlesex - Jeffrey Eugenides
Everything That Remains -Joshua Fields Millburn, Ryan Nicodemus
A Different Beautiful: Discovering and Celebrating Beauty in Places You Never Expected - Courtney Westlake
Life in a Jar: The Irena Sendler Project - Jack Mayer
The Distance Between Us: A Memoir - Reyna Grande
Breakpoint: The Changing Marketplace for Higher Education - Jon McGee
Our Kids: The American Dream in Crisis - Robert D. Putnam
When I Was Puerto Rican - Esmeralda Santiago
The Hate U Give - Angie Thomas
Hillbilly Elegy - JD Vance
The Great Gatsby - F. Scott Fitzgerald
Hidden Figures - Margot Lee Shetterly
Nominations for 2017
Code Talker: The first and only memoir by one of the original Navajo code talkers of WWII - Chester Nez with Judith Schiess Avila
Anti-Intellectualism in American Life - Richard Hofstadter
The 9/11 Report: A Graphic Adaptation - Sid Jacobson and Ernie Colón
American Boys - Jason Reynolds, Brendan Kiely
Ragtime - E.L. Doctorow
Inside Out & Back Again - Thanhha Lai
Autobiography of a Recovering Skinhead: The Frank Meeink Story - Frank Meeink
The Handmaid's Tale - Margaret Atwood
Lab Girl - Hope Jahren
Our Daily Bread; The Essential Norman Borlaug - Noel Vietmeyer
The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier & Clay - Michael Chabon
Gaining Ground: A Story of Farmers' Markets, Local Food, and Saving the Family Farm - Forrest Pritchard
Colored People - Henry Louis Gates, Jr.
The Boys in the Boat - Daniel James Brown
In Order to Live: A North Korean Girl's Journey to Freedom - Yeonmi Park
Exit West - Mohsin Hamid
Natural Born Heroes: Mastering the Lost Secrets of Strength and Endurance - Christopher McDougall
Americanah - Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie
Twelve Steps to a Compassionate Life - Karen Armstrong
Born A Crime - Trevor Noah
The Great Gatsby - F. Scott Fitzgerald
Rocket Boys - Homer Hickman
How the Garcia Girls Lost Their Accent - Julia Alvarez
The Mothers - Brit Bennett
Behold the Dreamers: A Novel - Imbolo Mbue
The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier & Clay - Michael Chabon
The Midnight Man - David Eric Tomlinson
The Book of Unknown Americans - Cristina Henríquez
The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian - Sherman Alexie
Middlesex - Jeffrey Eugenides
Everything That Remains -Joshua Fields Millburn, Ryan Nicodemus
A Different Beautiful: Discovering and Celebrating Beauty in Places You Never Expected - Courtney Westlake
Life in a Jar: The Irena Sendler Project - Jack Mayer
The Distance Between Us: A Memoir - Reyna Grande
Breakpoint: The Changing Marketplace for Higher Education - Jon McGee
Our Kids: The American Dream in Crisis - Robert D. Putnam
When I Was Puerto Rican - Esmeralda Santiago
The Hate U Give - Angie Thomas
Hillbilly Elegy - JD Vance
The Great Gatsby - F. Scott Fitzgerald
Hidden Figures - Margot Lee Shetterly
Nominations for 2016
Deferred Interest -Ryan Pollyea
Walk to Beautiful - Jimmy Wayne
Tribe - Sebastian Junger
Walden - Michael Dolan
In The Country We Love: My Family Divided - Diane Guerrero