Hurston/Wright Legacy Award Nominees and Winning Books

Hurston/Wright Legacy Award Winning Books

The Hurston/Wright Legacy Award™ honors the best in Black literature. Introduced in 2001, the Legacy Award was the first national award presented to Black writers by a national organization of Black writers. Fiction, debut fiction, nonfiction, and poetry honorees are selected in a juried competition. Each October, the award winners are celebrated during the Hurston/Wright Legacy Awards that draws hundreds of literary stars, readers, representatives of the publishing industry, the arts, media, politics, and academia. Learn more at the Hurston/Wright Foundation’s website


20 Books Honored by the Hurston/Wright Foundation in 2016

Winner - Debut Fiction

Click for a larger image of Mourner’s Bench: A Novel

Mourner’s Bench: A Novel
by Sanderia Faye

List Price: $19.95
University of Arkansas Press (Sep 01, 2015)
Fiction, Paperback, 340 pages
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Winner - Fiction

Click for a larger image of Delicious Foods: A Novel

Delicious Foods: A Novel
by James Hannaham

List Price: $26.00
Little, Brown and Company (Mar 17, 2015)
Fiction, Hardcover, 384 pages
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Winner - Nonfiction

Click for a larger image of Spectacle: The Astonishing Life Of Ota Benga

Spectacle: The Astonishing Life Of Ota Benga
by Pamela Newkirk

List Price: $25.99
Amistad (Jun 01, 2015)
Nonfiction, Hardcover
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Winner - Poetry

Click for a larger image of Forest Primeval: Poems

Forest Primeval: Poems
by Vievee Francis

List Price: $16.95
TriQuarterly Books (Nov 30, 2015)
Poetry, Paperback, 104 pages
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Finalist - Fiction

Click for a larger image of The Lost Child: A Novel

The Lost Child: A Novel
by Caryl Phillips

List Price: $26.00
Farrar, Straus and Giroux (Mar 10, 2015)
Fiction, Hardcover, 272 pages
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Finalist - Fiction

Click for a larger image of The Turner House

The Turner House
by Angela Flournoy

List Price: $23.00
Houghton Mifflin Harcourt (Apr 14, 2015)
Fiction, Hardcover, 352 pages
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Finalist - Nonfiction

Click for a larger image of The Light Of The World: A Memoir

The Light Of The World: A Memoir
by Elizabeth Alexander

List Price: $26.00
Grand Central Publishing (Apr 21, 2015)
Nonfiction, Hardcover, 224 pages
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Finalist - Nonfiction

Click for a larger image of Confronting Black Jacobins: The U.S., the Haitian Revolution, and the Origins of the Dominican Republic

Confronting Black Jacobins: The U.S., the Haitian Revolution, and the Origins of the Dominican Republic
by Gerald Horne

List Price: $25.00
Monthly Review Press (Oct 22, 2015)
Nonfiction, Paperback, 416 pages
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Finalist - Poetry

Click for a larger image of Honest Engine: Poems

Honest Engine: Poems
by Kyle Dargan

List Price: $16.95
University of Georgia Press (Apr 01, 2015)
Poetry, Paperback, 96 pages
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Finalist - Poetry

Click for a larger image of Catalog of Unabashed Gratitude (Pitt Poetry Series)

Catalog of Unabashed Gratitude (Pitt Poetry Series)
by Ross Gay

List Price: $15.95
University of Pittsburgh Press (Jan 07, 2015)
Poetry, Paperback, 112 pages
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Nominee - Debut Fiction

Click for a larger image of The Fishermen: A Novel

The Fishermen: A Novel
by Chigozie Obioma

List Price: $26.00
Little, Brown and Company (Apr 14, 2015)
Fiction, Hardcover, 304 pages
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Nominee - Debut Fiction

Click for a larger image of The Star Side of Bird Hill

The Star Side of Bird Hill
by Naomi Jackson

List Price: $25.95
Penguin Press (Jun 30, 2015)
Fiction, Hardcover, 304 pages
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Nominee - Fiction

Click for a larger image of Welcome to Braggsville: A Novel

Welcome to Braggsville: A Novel
by T. Geronimo Johnson

List Price: $25.99
Penguin Books (Feb 17, 2015)
Fiction, Hardcover, 384 pages
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Nominee - Fiction

Click for a larger image of Under the Udala Trees

Under the Udala Trees
by Chinelo Okparanta

List Price: $26.00
Houghton Mifflin Harcourt (Sep 22, 2015)
Fiction, Hardcover, 336 pages
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Nominee - Nonfiction

Click for a larger image of Where Everybody Looks Like Me: At the Crossroads of America’s Black Colleges and Culture

Where Everybody Looks Like Me: At the Crossroads of America’s Black Colleges and Culture
by Ron Stodghill

List Price: $26.99
Amistad (Sep 22, 2015)
Nonfiction, Hardcover, 272 pages
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Nominee - Nonfiction

Click for a larger image of Infectious Madness: The Surprising Science of How We

Infectious Madness: The Surprising Science of How We "Catch" Mental Illness
by Harriet A. Washington

List Price: $15.99
Back Bay Books (Oct 04, 2016)
Nonfiction, Paperback, 320 pages
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Nominee - Nonfiction

Click for a larger image of The Beast Side: Living (and Dying) While Black in America

The Beast Side: Living (and Dying) While Black in America
by D. Watkins

List Price: $21.99
Hot Books (Sep 08, 2015)
Nonfiction, Hardcover, 176 pages
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Nominee - Poetry

Click for a larger image of How to Be Drawn

How to Be Drawn
by Terrance Hayes

List Price: $20.00
William Morrow (Mar 31, 2015)
Poetry, Paperback, 112 pages
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Nominee - Poetry

Click for a larger image of It Seems Like a Mighty Long Time: Poems

It Seems Like a Mighty Long Time: Poems
by Angela Jackson

List Price: $18.95
TriQuarterly Books (Feb 15, 2015)
Poetry, Paperback, 144 pages
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Nominee - Poetry

Click for a larger image of Voyage of the Sable Venus: and Other Poems

Voyage of the Sable Venus: and Other Poems
by Robin Coste Lewis

List Price: $26.00
Knopf (Sep 29, 2015)
Poetry, Hardcover, 160 pages
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