Why We're Happy That Our Finalists Are Finalists For Other Book Awards, Too

On Feb. 21, I learned (via Twitter) that the three finalists for The Story Prize this year are also finalists for two other book awards. Don DeLillo's The Angel Esmeralda and Steven Millhauser's We Others are among the five finalists for the PEN/Faulkner Award for Fiction. And Edith Pearlman's Binocular Vision is one of five finalists for the Los Angeles Times Book Prize. It's also up for the National Book Critics Circle Award (as announced earlier) and was a finalist for the National Book Awards in November.

One reason we established The Story Prize partly was that we believed the major U.S. book awards for fiction hadn't often enough recognized short story collections—and that the form deserved its own award. Rarely does a story collection win these prizes. PEN/Faulkner has the best track record in this regard, having given its fiction prize to two story collections in the past two years: Sherman Alexie's War Dances in 2010 and The Collected Stories of Deborah Eisenberg in 2011, as well as three others in the past 20 years—for a total of five winners.

If you don't count Jennifer Egan's A Visit from the Goon Squad, which the publisher maintained was a novel, The Pulitzer Prize last went to a story collection in 2009—Elizabeth Strout's Olive Kitteridge. Before that, it most recently went to a story collection in 2000, when Jhumpa Lahiri won for Interpreter of Maladies. But those are the only two books of short fiction that have won in the past 20 years—even 30 years. The last short fiction winner before 2000 was The Stories of John Cheever in 1979.

A short story collection hasn't won the National Book Awards since Andrea Barrett's Ship Fever in 1996, and the last story collection to win before that was Ellen Gilchrist's Victory Over Japan in 1984. However, readers did choose The Complete Stories of Flannery O'Connor as the best book in the NBA's first 60 years in 2010. And more short story collections seem to have been among the finalists in recent years.

Excluding Egan's book last year, the last story collection to win the National Book Critics Circle Award for fiction was in 1998--Alice Munro's The Love of a Good Woman. Gina Beirault's Women in Their Beds, a 1996 winner (and also a PEN/Faulkner winner), is the only other story collection to win the NBCC award for fiction in the last 20 years. In my opinion, short story collections are harder for critics to write about, which is one reason I think this award is a tough one for short fiction entries to crack.

In any event, we're happy that all three of this year's finalists for The Story Prize have a shot at winning other awards, too, because we believe in these three books and wish them—and short story collections in general—as much favorable attention as possible. Good luck all.

(You can see DeLillo. Millhauser, and Pearlman read and discuss their work at The Story Prize event at The New School on March 21.)

Two Short Story Collections Are Finalists for the National Book Awards

Here's something I don't get tired of: More good news about short story collections. The National Book Awards announced their fiction finalists yesterday, and two of the five are short story collections: Bonnie Jo Campbell's American Salavage and Daniyal Mueunuddin's In Other Rooms, Other Wonders. Readers of this blog (who are legion) may remember that in a previous post about summer reading, I pointed out that author and NPR commentator Alan Cheuse had recommended Muenuddin's collection. Well, guess what, he'd also recommended Jayne Anne Phillips' evocative novel* Lark and Termite, which is another finalist for the National Book Awards. While Cheuse is only one of the five fiction judges, in retrospect his summer picks provided a partial preview of the NBA finalists.

As I said in that post, I can highly recommend Muenuddin's excellent collection. Yesterday, Bonnie Jo Campbell's book immediately jumped to the top of my pile and, half way through, I'd have to say it's a brilliant choice by the NBA judges. It's especially impressive because of the huge number of fiction entries (236) they read this year. One of the best things a book award can do is to shine the spotlight on deserving and underappreciated books, authors, and publishers. This group of judges obviously didn't cut any corners and gave their full attention to a university press book (Wayne State) that didn't get widespread attention. Kudos to them. That's why Julie and I make sure we read everything we get. You never know where you'll find a gem.

By the way, one of the other NBA judges is author Lydia Millet, who has a short story collection, Love in Infant Monkeys, just out from indy publisher Softskull Press. I wouldn't be surprised if she were a big advocate of Campbell's collection, but that's just a guess.

* Full disclosure, Jayne Anne is a colleague of my wife's at Rutgers-Newark, and a friend of ours.

Genius Authors, Enduring Works, Book Club Choices, Best-Sellers, Award Winners

I can't keep up with all of the great things that are happening for short stories and short story writers, so for now, I'm just going to list the latest and hope to circle back later to discuss some of these at greater length. Here's what has been happening so far this month:

Two Short Story Writers Win MacArthur Foundation Fellowships.
Among this years "genius grant" recipients are short story writer Deborah Eisenberg (a pure play) and the first ever winner of The Story Prize, Edwidge Danticat, whose second short story collection, The Dew Breaker, is often classified as a novel.

Four of the Six Finalists for the Best of the National Book Awards Fiction Are Short Story Collections.
In 60 years, and out of 77 books, only 11 have been short story collections. But a panel of 140 writers chose four of those books among the six finalists. Those collections are: The Stories of John Cheever, The Collected Stories of William Faulkner, The Complete Stories of Flannery O'Connor, and The Collected Stories of Eudora Welty. Short story collections are, without a doubt, among the most enduring works of American literature.

The Latest Oprah's Book Club Selection Is a Short Story Collection.
On September 18, Oprah Winfrey announced that Say You're One of Them by Uwem Akpan is the next book club selection--the first time she's chosen a short story collection.

Soon There Will Be Three Short Story Collections on The New York Times Best-Seller List.
When Akpan's book hits The New York Times Best-Seller List for trade paperbacks, it's very likely that it will join two other short story collections: Olive Kitteridge by Elizabeth Strout and Unaccustomed Earth by Jhumpa Lahiri. Who says short story collections don't sell?

The Inaugural $50,000 St. Francis College Literary Prize Goes to a Short Story Collection.
On September 12, as part of the Brooklyn Book Festival, Aleksander Hemon's short story collection Love and Obstacles was announced as the winner of this new book award for mid-career authors.

In addition, the Frank O'Connor International Short Story Award just announced it's surprising winner, Simon Van Booy's Love Begins in Winter.

More on much of this later. For now, I rest my case.

Sixty Years of the National Book Awards (and a Losing Streak for Short Stories)

What do National League baseball and the short story have in common? Similar losing streaks, at least by one measure. Including last night's 4-3 loss to the American League, the National League hasn't won the All-Star game since 1996, which is the last time a short story collection--Ship Fever by Andrea Barrett--won the National Book Award for fiction.

This has come to my attention because, in celebrating its 60th Anniversary this year, the National Book Awards is currently looking back at the 77 works of fiction (some years there were multiple winners for different categories) it has honored. Altogether, 11 short story collections have won National Book Awards for fiction since 1950:

1951: The Collected Stories of William Faulkner
1959: The Magic Barrel by Bernard Malamud
1960: Goodbye, Columbus by Philip Roth
1966: The Collected Stories of Katherine Anne Porter
1972: The Complete Stories of Flannery O'Connor
1974: A Crown of Feathers and Other Stories by Isaac Bashevis Singer
1981: The Stories of John Cheever (paperback)
1983: Collected Stories of Eudora Welty (paperback)
1984: Victory over Japan by Ellen Gilchrist
1985: Easy in the Islands by Bob Shacochis (first work of fiction)
1996: Ship Fever and Other Stories by Andrea Barrett

This is a pretty solid list, with a virtual Murderers' Row of mid-20th Century short story greats: Faulkner, Malamud, Porter, O'Connor, Singer, Cheever, and Welty. Any book award would be proud to have these authors on its roster. And, of course, it's inevitable that some talent will be stuck on the bench. For instance, it would be nice to see collections by writers such as Donald Barthelme, Raymond Carver, Andre Dubus, Grace Paley, Lorrie Moore, and Tobias Wolff (among others) represented. But arguing with the choices is a futile exercise. It all comes down to how the judges/umpires call it. And it's worth keeping in mind that there were good novels published every year, too. Besides, short story writers play small ball, while novelists often swing for the fences.

In any event, one major reason The Story Prize exists is precisely to rectify this imbalance and make short stories are the star of the game for once. I can only hope that we last for 60 years and compile as vital a list of books and authors as the National Book Awards has (and that a short story collection and the National League will come through one of these years).