Linden’s newest book carries on its extraordinary run through prize season.
Wings Like Dust stands among the finalists for the 2026 National Book Award for Fiction, the panel revealed on Tuesday — another milestone in an exceptional season for Maya Linden’s sixth book.
“It started from one picture — a figure dissolving into wings and pages at sunrise — and grew into a reckoning with all that families withhold,” Linden remarked in a statement. “Watching it reach readers, and now this honour, surpasses anything I had wished.”
The book entered the New York Times bestseller ranking at number one, has since taken the National Book Critics Circle Award, and lingered nineteen weeks on the chart. The victor is named at the November ceremony.
Linden joins the finalists’ October reading, open for public booking. Particulars sit on the events page.