Video: The Story Prize Event on March 8 at The New School with Finalists Anna Noyes and Helen Maryles Shankman and Winner Rick Bass

Here's the video of The Story Prize event on March 8 at The New School. That night, the three finalists—Rick Bass, Anna Noyes, and Helen Maryles Shankman—read from and discussed their work on-stage. And at the culmination of the event, we announced the winner for books published in 2016: Rick Bass's For a Little While.

(Real) News About The Story Prize Event

Finalists Rick Bass, Helen Maryles Shankman, and Anna Noyes
(photo @ Beowulf Sheehan)

Here are links to some of the news coverage that The Story Prize event on March 8 at The New School has garnered—none of it fake.

The San Francisco Chronicle
Library Journal
Poets & Writers

Shelf Awareness

Publishers Weekly
Associated Press

That night, we announced Rick Bass's For a Little While as the winner for books published in 2016. He received $20,000 and an engraved silver bowl. The other two finalists, Anna Noyes for Goodnight, Beautiful Women and Helen Maryles Shankman for They Were Like Family to Me, each received $5,000.

What the Judges Had to Say About Helen Maryles Shankman's They Were Like Family to Me

© Beowulf Sheehan

When the three judges for The Story Prize make their choices, they provide citations for the books. This year's judges were Harold Augenbraum, Sarah Shun-lien Bynum, and Daniel Goldin. We include the citations in congratulatory letters we present to each finalist, along with their checks ($20,000 to the winner, $5,000 to the other two finalists). To protect the confidentiality of the judges' votes and the integrity of the process, we don't attribute citations to any particular judge.

“The stories in They Were Like Family to Me are connected around the Polish town of Włodawa, which the Nazis occupied during World War II. The stories dance around Reich Regional Commissioner Reinhart, the bureaucrat who has a taste for the finer things and is willing to protect his most talented Jews. The author weaves in Jewish folktales, making them seem like family legends. Several of the incidents, like the merchants forced to do jumping jacks for the amusement of Nazi guards, appear in several of the stories. And minor characters in one story take center stage in the other. There’s no question that Helen Maryles Shankman had my attention in the first story, when the brutal Nazi officer Max Haas hires a Jewish man to paint his apartment, only to realize the man is the illustrator of his child’s favorite children’s book. At one point, I gasped and had to talk about the story to just about anyone I came in contact with for the rest of the day. I couldn’t help it. And I loved the classic way that the Reinhart character plays at the periphery of so many stories before we finally get his perspective.”

The Story Prize Finalists: Rick Bass, Anna Noyes, and Helen Maryles Shankman

We're pleased to honor as finalists for The Story Prize three outstanding books published in 2016, chosen from 106 entries representing 72 different publishers or imprints. The finalists are:

• For a Little While by Rick Bass (Little, Brown)
• Goodnight, Beautiful Women by Anna Noyes (Grove Press)
• They Were Like Family to Me* by Helen Maryles Shankman (Scribner)

For a Little While by Rick Bass collects seven new stories and eighteen selected from previous collections, that together represent the work of one of the most skillful contemporary practitioners of the short story form. The eleven stories in Anna Noyes's Goodnight, Beautiful Women, set in coastal Maine, span the lives of people struggling to get by and those from more privileged circumstances, who nonetheless face obstacles of their own. Helen Maryles Shankman's collection, They Were Like Family to Me, adds layers of magical realism to eight stories that focus on Włodowa, an occupied town in Poland during World War II, offering the points of view of German officers, Jews, Poles, and modern day descendants of some of these characters.

This year's judges—former National Book Awards Executive Director Harold Augenbraum, author Sarah Shun-lien Bynum, and Milwaukee bookseller Daniel Goldin—will decide the outcome.

The annual award event will take place at the New School’s Auditorium at 66 West 12 Street in New York City at 7:30 p.m. on Wed., March 8. Tickets cost $14. That night, Bass, Noyes, and Shankman will read from and discuss their work on-stage. At the end of the event, Julie Lindsey will announce the winner and present that author with $20,000 along with an engraved silver bowl. The two runners-up will each receive $5,000.

In the weeks ahead, we'll announce this year's winner of The Story Prize Spotlight Award. We'll also publish an index of guest posts from 2016 authors and a long list of other exceptional collections we read last year.

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* They Were Like Family to Me is the title of the paperback edition. The book was published in hardcover as In the Land of Armadillos.