Today showed the championship match in the 2009 Tournament of Books, a bracket-style competition with the best 16 novels of the last year – not unlike something we did last semester.

This is the fifth year The Morning News has held this glorious competition, which is judged by readers and all sorts of literary people, including wonderboy Junot Diaz, who won last year.

From the TOB website:

“We mention this because the Tournament of Books is one of those concepts that only could have been conceived and subsequently executed by people who used to drink a lot but now drink considerably less. In the absence of too much alcohol, it never would have occurred to us that we should take 16 of the most celebrated and highly touted novels of the year, seed them in a March Madness-type bracket, conscript them into a “Battle Royale of Literary Excellence,” and, in honor of David Sedaris’s brother, present the author of the winning book a live rooster.”

Toni Morrison’s A Mercy came out on top this year, winning over Tom Piazza’s City of Refuge. The big question is: what will she do with her newly gained live rooster? Eat it? Keep it as a pet? Kill it and stuff it as an eternal trophy of her success?

Image from The Morning News