Established in 2015 by Vermont College of Fine Arts, the Vermont Book Award is an annual, literary prize that honors work of outstanding literary merit by Vermont authors and celebrates the long tradition of literature in the state, supported by partnership between Vermont College of Fine Arts, the Vermont Department of Libraries, and Vermont Humanities.
This year's finalists:
Creative nonfiction
· Nancy Marie Brown for Looking for the Hidden Folk: How Iceland's Elves Can Save the Earth
· Kathryn Davis for Aurelia, Aurélia
· Peter Orner for Still No Word from You: Notes in the Margin
Fiction
· Caren Beilin for Revenge of the Scapegoat
· Ann Dávila Cardinal for The Storyteller’s Death
· Louise Glück for Marigold and Rose
· Erin Stalcup for Keen
Poetry
· Rage Hezekiah for Yearn
· Carol Potter for What Happens Next Is Anyone's Guess
· Bianca Stone for What Is Otherwise Infinite
Children’s literature
· Margot Harrison for We Made it All Up (young adult)
· Jo Knowles for Meant to Be (middle grade)
· Zoë Tilley Poster for The Night Wild (picture book)
· Leda Schubert for Firsts and Lasts: The Changing Seasons (picture book)
The Vermont Book Award finalists will be celebrated, and the winners announced, Saturday, May 6th, 2023 at 7 PM, in Alumnx Hall at the Vermont College of Fine Arts in Montpelier.
*A NEW YORK TIMES BOOK REVIEW EDITOR'S CHOICE*
"An impassioned, informative love letter to Iceland." —New York Times Book Review
"This compelling and highly readable book offers a thought-provoking examination of nature of belief itself" —Bookpage, starred review
In exploring how Icelanders interact with nature—and their id
An eerily dreamlike memoir, and the first work of nonfiction by one of our most inventive novelists.
Unfortunately, this book is not available to order through us. Please try Powells.com or Biblio.com.
Finalist for the Vermont Book Award
Finalist for the PEN/Diamonstein-Spielvogel Award for the Art of the Essay
A new collection of pieces on literature and life by the author of Am I Alone Here?, a finalist for the NBCC Award for Criticism
From the author of Blackfishing the IUD, a darkly hilarious novel about familial trauma, chronic illness, academic labor, and contemporary art.
"A beautiful book about family, memories, and the power of stories." —BuzzFeed
"Mystical, masterful storytelling." —Ms. Magazine
Marigold and Rose is a magical and incandescent fiction from the Nobel laureate Louise Glück.
Keen imagines that the ancient Irish custom of hiring women to mourn at funerals has continued into the modern day, and follows the most famous keener in world, Maeve McNamara, during the height of her career. Told in a plural first-person point of view, this book follows the group of people who adore Maeve.
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Contour is a lie—a sensitive line. It grieves the separation between the body and the land. It asks the enduring question of illusive space: Are we indeed dissociable and, above all else, manageable? In a series of liberatory poems, Rage Hezekiah’s second collection, Yearn, speaks this boundary aloud by working up to its conscious edge.
Unfortunately, this book is not available to order through us. Please try Powells.com or Biblio.com.
Here is a collection that reveals what happens when skill meets substantial talent. And what, precisely, is it that happens? The unpredictable--from poem to poem, line to line, a cascade of surprises. Mischief, memory, dream and lusty desire come into play here, and one recurring feature: in virtuoso displays of heady language, the blood and bone of the animal and natural world.
Finalist for the New England Book Award in Poetry and the Vermont Book Award
As heard on NPR Morning Edition
A New York Public Library Best Book of 2022
A contemporary, high-stakes thriller about how reality becomes more twisted than the fantasy novel two friends are writing when the real-life subject of their fiction turns up dead and they’re the suspects, for fans of Mare of Easttown and One of Us Is Lying.
Celeste is the talk of the town when she moves to Montana from Montreal, but
In a companion to Where the Heart Is, the lens turns to younger sister Ivy as she fields the joys and pitfalls of new friendship, hones her passion for baking, and resists the idea of change.
A stunningly illustrated picture book debut about a dog's fantastical moonlit adventure and wild new friendship.
With evocative words and glorious cut-paper collages, this celebration of the transitions between seasons summons the first—and last—signals of the seasonal cycle.