Of course not. We all have busy lives. It's hard to read everything--reading takes time. Or maybe you have read all the nominated books (in which case, great, but stop showing off) but still need a reminder because you read some of those books so very long ago.

Here is a refresher on what's nominated--plus links to sample chapters so you can talk about the winners without doing too much legwork. Check out the list below (thanks to the good people over at Galleycat).

Oh yes, and follow us on Twitter (you should follow us anyway). We will be live-tweeting the ceremony.

National Book Award Finalists for 2012

FICTION

Junot Dí­az, This Is How You Lose Her
Riverhead Books, a member of Penguin Group (USA) Inc.

Dave Eggers, A Hologram for the King
McSweeney’s Books

Louise Erdrich, The Round House
Harper, an imprint of HarperCollinsPublishers

Ben Fountain, Billy Lynn’s Long Halftime Walk
Ecco, an imprint of HarperCollinsPublishers

Kevin Powers, The Yellow Birds
Little, Brown and Company

NONFICTION

Anne Applebaum, Iron Curtain: The Crushing of Eastern Europe, 1945-1956 Doubleday

Katherine Boo, Behind the Beautiful Forevers: Life, Death, and Hope in a Mumbai Undercity
Random House

Robert A. Caro, The Passage of Power: The Years of Lyndon Johnson, Volume 4
Knopf

Domingo Martinez, The Boy Kings of Texas
Lyons Press, an imprint of Globe Pequot Press

Anthony Shadid, House of Stone: A Memoir of Home, Family, and a Lost Middle East
Houghton Mifflin Harcourt

POETRY

David Ferry, Bewilderment: New Poems and Translations
University of Chicago Press

Cynthia Huntington, Heavenly Bodies
Southern Illinois University Press

Tim Seibles, Fast Animal
Etruscan Press

Alan Shapiro, Night of the Republic
Houghton Mifflin Harcourt

Susan Wheeler, Meme
University of Iowa Press

YOUNG PEOPLE’S LITERATURE

William Alexander, Goblin Secrets
Margaret K. McElderry Books, an imprint of Simon & Schuster Children’s Publishing

Carrie Arcos, Out of Reach
Simon Pulse, an imprint of Simon & Schuster Children’s Publishing

Patricia McCormick, Never Fall Down
Balzer+Bray, an imprint of HarperCollinsPublishers

Eliot Schrefer, Endangered
Scholastic

Steve Sheinkin, Bomb: The Race to Build—- and Steal– – the World’s Most Dangerous Weapon
Flash Point, an imprint of Roaring Brook Press