Authors Jesmyn Ward and James McBride are among the nominees for the 10th annual Kirkus Prizes

Novels by Jesmyn Ward and James McBride and story collections by Jamal Brinkley and Kelly Link are among the finalists for the Kirkus Prizes, for which winners in fiction, nonfiction and young reader’s literature each receive $50,000. Kirkus judges selected six books for each of the three categories, with winners to be announced Oct. 11. Ward’s slave narrative “Let Us Descend” and McBride’s 20th century tale “The Heaven & Earth Grocery Store” were nominated in fiction, along with Brinkley’s “Witness,” Link’s “White Cat, Black Dog,” Irish novelist Paul Murray’s “The Bee Sting” and New Zealander Eleanor Catton’s “Birnam Wood.”