Colum McCann's novel Let the Great World Spin, a portrait of interconnected relationships on one summer day in 1970s New York, has won the prestigious fiction prize at the 60th annual U.S. National Book Awards gala.

McCann's novel, set against Philippe Petit's historic high-wire walk between the World Trade Center towers in 1974, was highly praised by author Frank McCourt, who had described it as a "blockbuster groundbreaking heartbreaking symphony of a novel."

Accepting the award Wednesday night, McCann dedicated his win to the Angela's Ashes author, who died in July of cancer.

"I think he's dancing upstairs," McCann said of his fellow Irish-American colleague.

The First Tycoon, a biography of shipping and railroad magnate Cornelius Vanderbilt, by T.J. Stiles, was named winner of the non-fiction prize, while the poetry honour went to Transcendental Studies: A Trilogy, a selection of recent work by poet and translater Keith Waldrop.

Phillip Hoose, winner of the young people's literature award for his book Claudette Colvin, brought his 70-year-old subject and early Civil Rights activist on-stage with him to accept the honour.

As a teenager, Colvin was arrested for refusing to give up her seat on a Montgomery, Ala. bus to a white passenger — months before a similar incident with Rosa Parks sparked the Montgomery bus boycott, a seminal battle in the fight for civil rights in the United States.

To celebrate the 60th anniversary of the National Book Awards, the public was asked to vote for the best fiction winner in the prize's six-decade history. Flannery O'Connor's The Complete Stories took the title.

Held at New York restaurant Cipriani Wall Street and hosted by satirist Andy Borowitz, the evening gala also included special tributes to Gore Vidal, who was recognized with a lifetime achievement award, and Dave Eggers, who was honoured for his contributions to the literary community.

With files from The Associated Press