Annual Gotham Book Prize is awarded to the best book set in or about New York City each year
Winner will be selected by jury of leading New Yorkers and authors and awarded $50,000
Deacon King Kong by James McBride was selected as the first annual Gotham Book Prize winner in April 2021
NEW YORK, Jan. 26, 2022 /PRNewswire/ — The Gotham Book Prize, an annual award created to encourage and honor writing about New York City in light of the Covid-19 pandemic, today announced the ten finalists for the second annual winner. A jury made up of leading New Yorkers and authors nominated a short list of ten eligible books, including:
New York, New York: Four Decades of Success, Excess & Transformation by Tom Dyja
The Other Black Girl by Zakiya Dalila Harris
Harlem Shuffle by Colson Whitehead
Invisible Child: Poverty, Survival & Hope in an American City by Andrea Elliott
Let the Record Show: A Political History of ACT UP New York, 1987-1993 by Sarah Schulman
Astrid Sees All by Natalie Standiford
Detransition, Baby by Torrey Peters
When We Make It by Elizabeth Velasquez
Ghosts of New York by Jim Lewis
Libertie by Kaitlyn Greenidge
The Gotham Book Prize was created in July 2020 by Bradley Tusk and Howard Wolfson to support New York City and its arts community by recognizing what makes the city so special as it continues to recover from Covid-19. The Prize is awarded annually to the best book published that calendar year (both works of fiction and nonfiction) that either is about New York City or takes place in New York City. Deacon King Kong by James McBride was selected as the first annual Gotham Book Prize winner in April 2021. The jury will vote on one winner and the prize will be awarded in March of 2022. The winner will receive $50,000
“As Covid continues to present new challenges to our city, we remain committed to honoring our city’s writers and supporting their work,” said Howard Wolfson and Bradley Tusk in a statement. “The last two years have shown just how resilient this city, the people and its arts community really are. Our goal is that by supporting great books, this will help and encourage even more writers to focus on the greatest city in the world.”
While Covid-19 continues to present challenges, New York City is still attracting the attention and imagination of creative, smart, ambitious people from all over the world. That attraction stems from the city’s unique diversity and energy, portrayed so well and so often in books and films, in movies and songs. That attraction is essential to keeping the city’s spirit alive even as it works to reopen and recover.
The jury of leading New Yorkers and authors that will select the award’s winner, include:
Writer, entrepreneur and sociologist Anna Akbari
Documentarian and filmmaker Ric Burns
Novelist and memoirist Stephanie Danler
Fordham professor and political scientist Dr. Christina Greer
Writer, poet and Director of the Curator Culture series at The Bass Museum Tom Healy
NYU Professor and Director of the Rudin Center for Transportation Mitchell Moss
American University professor and novelist Patricia Park
Novelist Melissa Rivero
Poet Safiya Sinclair
Queens Public Library CEO and former NYC Schools Chancellor Dennis Walcott
Wolfson works for Bloomberg Philanthropies, serving as its Education program lead and also runs Mike Bloomberg’s SuperPAC. Tusk is a venture capitalist, political strategist, writer and philanthropist. The two became friends while working on Bloomberg’s 2009 re-election campaign. Tusk is opening a new independent bookstore and podcast studio, P&T Knitwear, on the Lower East Side in May 2022.
The winner, named in March 2022, is Invisible Child by Andrea Elliott.
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SOURCE Gotham Book Prize and PR Newswire
