World Literary Awards

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American Book Awards あめりかんぶっくあわーど

Edition 40 (2019)

Literary awardMulticultural literatureNo genre restrictions (novels, poetry, non-fiction, etc.)

Winners

18 people
Frank Abe Winner
365 pages
Greg Robinson Winner
365 pages
Floyd Cheung Winner
365 pages
May-lee Chai Winner

This short story collection moves between mainland China and the Chinese diaspora in the United States, tracing the uncertainty of immigrants and their children, family secrets, and tensions shaped by language and class. Small domestic scenes gradually reveal the pain of displacement and the possibility of renewal.

A story collection that captures the quiet but urgent emotions of people living across borders.

166 pages
immigrationChinese diasporafamily relationshipslanguageclassshort stories

Through a set of frank essays, the author revisits family history, Italian American identity, violence, loss, and the hesitation to write about painful truths. The book uses personal memory to ask what it means to live as a woman and a writer.

A memoir that reweaves private wounds and cultural memory with quiet but sharp prose.

232 pages
memoirfamily historyItalian American identitywomen's experienceviolencewriting

An anthology of Native poets whose first books were published in the twenty-first century. It brings together a wide range of tribal backgrounds and poetic forms to show the breadth of contemporary Native poetry.

An anthology that opens a clear view onto the new landscape of Native poetry.

284 pages
poetry anthologyNative American literaturetribal diversitycontemporary poetry

Drawing on folklore, fantasy, and childhood memory, this poetry collection examines the pressures of masculinity and the vulnerability beneath them. It traces the origins of violence and silence while sketching a self shaped by fragility.

Poems that do not skirt the wound but enter it directly.

89 pages
poetrymasculinitymemoryfantasyviolenceLatinx literature
Tommy Orange Winner

A multivoiced novel about urban Native people in Oakland. Family rupture, addiction, historical trauma, and the search for reconnection converge as the characters move toward a large community gathering.

A novel that brings the present tense of urban Native life into focus through intersecting lives.

304 pages
novelIndigenous literatureensemble castfamilyurban lifehistorical trauma

A memoir tracing four decades of a Black woman dancer's life as it intersects with dance history. Across experiences in the United States, Europe, and Africa, it explores the connection between art, the body, and politics.

A memoir that links the history of Black dance and self-making through bodily memory.

378 pages
memoirdanceBlack womanhoodart historythe bodypolitics

A frank memoir that uses the weight of the body, secrecy, addiction, and family ties to examine the pressures of living as a Black man. Personal pain opens outward into larger social structures.

A memoir that reads social gravity through the memory carried in one body.

256 pages
memoirBlack experiencefamilythe bodyaddictionsocial critique
Mark Sarvas Winner
276 pages
932 pages
136 pages
Nico Leon Winner
136 pages
Nathan Hare Lifetime Achievement Award
Moor Mother Winner