The Society for Advancing Business Editing and Writing announced the shortlist for its fourth annual Best in Business Book Awards, which recognizes and celebrates outstanding business books published between Aug. 1, 2022, and July 31, 2023.
A prestigious panel of judges selected 20 books for this year’s shortlist. Twelve books are from the “business reporting” category, sponsored by Investopedia and four are from the category sponsored by Yahoo! Finance, “investing and personal finance.” The four remaining books on the shortlist are from the newly added “management and leadership” category.
The 20 books the judges selected for the shortlist are:
Business Reporting
- Built from the Fire: The Epic Story of Tulsa’s Greenwood District, America’s Black Wall Street by Victor Luckerson
- California Burning: The Fall of Pacific Gas and Electric – and What It Means for America’s Power Grid by Katherine Blunt
- Billionaire’s Row: Tycoons, High Rollers, and the Epic Race to Build the World’s Most Exclusive Skyscrapers by Katherine Clarke
- These are the Plunderers: How Private Equity Runs – and Wrecks – America by Gretchen Morgenson and Joshua Rosner
- Fancy Bear Goes Phishing: The Dark History of the Information Age, in Five Extraordinary Hacks by Scott J. Shapiro
- Crash Landing: The Inside Story of How the World’s Biggest Companies Survived an Economy on the Brink by Liz Hoffman
- Unscripted: The Epic Battle for a Media Empire and the Redstone Family Legacy by James B. Stewart and Rachel Abrams
- Random Acts of Medicine: The Hidden Forces That Sway Doctors, Impact Patients, and Shape Our Health by Anupam B. Jena and Christopher Worsham
- Sideways: The City Google Couldn’t Buy by Josh O’Kane
- Yellen: The Trailblazing Economist Who Navigated an Era of Upheaval by Jon Hilsenrath
- Winner Sells All: Amazon, Walmart, and the Battle for Our Wallets by Jason Del Rey
- When McKinsey Comes to Town: The Hidden Influence of the World’s Most Powerful Consulting Firm by Walt Bogdanich and Michael Forsythe
Investing and Personal Finance
- How to Invest: Masters of the Craft by David M. Rubenstein
- The Phoenix Economy: Work, Life, and Money in the New Not Normal by Felix Salmon
- Wealth Warrior: 8 Steps for Communities of Color to Conquer the Stock Market by Linda Garcia
- Retirement Reboot: Commonsense Financial Strategies for Getting Back on Track by Mark Miller
Management and Leadership
- How Big Things Get Done: The Surprising Factors That Determine the Fate of Every Project, from Home Renovations to Space Exploration and Everything in Between by Bent Flyvbjerg and Dan Gardner
- Credible: The Power of Expert Leaders by Amanda Goodall
- Still Broke: Walmart’s Remarkable Transformation and the Limits of Socially Conscious Capitalism by Rick Wartzman
- Smart Brevity: The Power of Saying More with Less by Jim VandeHei, Mike Allen and Roy Schwartz
The judges were led by Alan Deutschman, professor and Reynolds Endowed Chair of Business Journalism at the University of Nevada, Reno, and Caleb Silver, editor-in-chief at Investopedia. Submissions came from authors or their publishers such as Agate Publishing; Crown Currency; Doubleday; Farrar, Straus and Giroux; HarperCollins; Legacy Lit; Penguin Random House; Portfolio Books; PublicAffairs; Simon & Schuster; and Workman Publishing.
“It was great to see so many excellent submissions,” said Deutschman. “This year’s short list includes the hardcover debuts of exciting new voices as well as terrific new books by veteran business journalists who are legends in their field.”
“This year’s entries for SABEW’s Best in Business Book Awardsproved, once again, that business journalism is as strong as it has ever been,” said Silver. “The judges were unequivocally impressed by the range, depth and importance of all the entries across categories, making this year’s shortlist very difficult to narrow down. Congratulations to all the authors.”
The winning authors from each category will be awarded a $1,000 cash prize and finalists from each category will receive $500. The results will be announced later this fall, and SABEW will host a one-on-one discussion with the winners to celebrate their accomplishment and share their knowledge.
