Brandon Taylor's Filthy Animals is the 18th Winner of The Story Prize!

© Beowulf Sheehan

The winner of The Story Prize for books published in 2021 is Filthy Animals Riverhead Books) by Brandon Taylor. Riverhead has been a strong supporter of short fiction over the years, and this is the third time one of its books has won The Story Prize. The other two winners are Battleborn by Claire Vaye Watkins in 2013 and Florida by Lauren Groff in 2019. Other Riverhead finalists have been George Saunders, Junot Díaz, Daniel Alarcón, and Danielle Evans.

 

A video we've posted on YouTube features readings by and interviews with Taylor and the other two finalists for books published in 2021: Five Tuesdays in Winter by Lily King (Grove Press) and Let Me Think by J. Robert Lennon (Graywolf Press).

 

The Story Prize’s $20,000 top prize is among the largest first-prize amounts of any annual U.S. book award for fiction. Taylor also received an engraved silver bowl, which The Story Prize presents to all winners. As runners-up, King and Lennon each received $5,000.

Director Larry Dark and Founder Julie Lindsey selected the three finalists for The Story Prize, now in its 18th year, from among 119 books entered in 2021, representing 90 different publishers or imprints. Three judges—librarian and writer Dev Aujla; critic, writer, and librarian David Kipen; and writer Kirstin Valdez Quade—determined the winner from among the three books chosen as finalists. 

Filthy Animals is also a finalist for The Swansea University Dylan Thomas Prize for the best published literary work in the English language, written by an author age 39 or under. 

 

Buy Filthy Animals, Five Tuesdays in Winter, Let Me Think other story collections published in 2021 from your local bookseller or on Bookshop.

Congratulations to Brandon Taylor, and to Riverhead Books!