The Los Angeles Times has been awarding prizes for the best books now for 44 years. The awards, held in conjunction with the annual LA Times Book Festival, were handed out Friday evening, April 19, 2024. There are 13 categories for the prize, alongside the Robert Kirsch Award, given to a living writing whose work has a major connection to the American West. All winners receive $1,000 and a citation.
Eligible titles for the prize must have been published within the last year in English in the US. They may have been originally written in a language other than English upon initial publication.
The LA Times Annual Book Prize Winners for 2024 in each category are:
- Achievement in Audiobook Production: Dion Graham and Elishia Merricks, Thank You (Falettinme Be Mice Elf Agin): A Memoir (by Sly Stone).
- Art Seidenbaum Award for First Fiction: Shannon Sanders for Company: Stories.
- Biography: Gregg Hecimovich for The Life and Times of Hannah Crafts: The True Story of The Bondwoman’s Narrative.
- Christopher Isherwood Prize for Autobiographical Prose: Claire Dederer for Monsters: A Fan’s Dilemma.
- Current Interest: Roxanna Asgarian for We Were Once A Family: A Story of Love, Death, and Child Removal in America.
- Fiction: Ed Park for Same Bed Different Dreams: A Novel.
- Graphic Novel/Comics: Emily Carroll for A Guest in the House.
- History: Joya Chatterji for Shadows at Noon: The South Asian Twentieth Century.
- Mystery/Thriller: Ivy Pochoda for Sing Her Down: A Novel.
- Poetry: Airea D. Matthews for Bread and Circus: Poems.
- Science Fiction, Fantasy & Speculative Fiction: Tananarive Due for The Reformatory: A Novel.
- Science & Technology: Eugenia Cheng for Is Math Real? How Simple Questions Lead Us to Mathematics’ Deepest Truths.
- Young Adult Literature: Amber McBride for Gone Wolf.
The Robert Kirsch Award was given to Jane Smiley, while the Innovator’s Award was given to Access Books, an organization which has been renovating school libraries and helping underserved students and districts get access to literature.
More information about the winners and the LA Times Book Prize, as well as its history, can be found on its website.
Find more news and stories of interest from the book world in Breaking in Books.
