2019 SFC Literary Prize Shortlist Announced
St. Francis College (SFC) has announced the finalists for its 2019 SFC Literary Prize, a $50,000 biennial award for an author’s third to fifth work of published fiction. The prize winner will be announced at the Brooklyn Book Festival’s gala on September 21 at City Point in Brooklyn. SFC is a sponsor of the Brooklyn Book Festival.
The finalists are:
- Gun Love by Jennifer Clement
- This Mournable Body by Tsitsi Dangarembga
- Where the Dead Sit Talking by Brandon Hobson
- The Dark Dark by Samantha Hunt
- The Line That Held Us by David Joy
- New People by Danzy Senna
The SFC Literary Prize was launched in 2009 to recognize "outstanding fiction by writers in the middle stages of their careers, once they have advanced beyond eligibility for awards for authors’ debut works." This year’s call for submissions attracted 184 entries, up from 40 in its inaugural year.
Prior years’ SFC Literary Prize Winners are Dana Spiotta for Innocents and Others (2017); Maud Casey for The Man Who Walked Away (2015); David Vann, Dirt (2013); Jonathan Dee for The Privileges (2011); and Aleksandar Hemon for Love and Obstacles (2009).
"We had quite a number of worthy candidates in submissions we received,” SFC English professor Ian Maloney, the prize's director and cofounder, with SFC associate professor of history Timothy Houlihan, said in a statement. “I commend this excellent and engaged jury for selecting a diverse, innovative, and powerful group of finalists, who are all worthy of this recognition. I can't wait to see who the jury finally decides upon because each one of these books packs a punch and is worthy of the award."
Maloney and a three-member jury—writer Chris Abani, novelist Kate Christensen, and fiction writer Ron Currie—reviewed this year’s entries and selected the finalists.
