Annual Awards Benefit

About the Benefit

Each December, the literary world comes together at The Center for Fiction Awards Benefit to celebrate and support the creation and enjoyment of the art of fiction. Please join us as we honor excellence and achievement in writing and publishing. Funds raised by the Benefit provide essential support for all of The Center's work, including transformative opportunities for emerging writers, exceptional public programming, and immersive educational experiences for public school students throughout the five boroughs, fostering a sense of community among diverse readers and writers through the art of storytelling in all its forms. We look forward to celebrating with you.

For more information about The Center for Fiction Annual Awards Benefit, please reach out to Melissa Wyse, Development Director, at melissa@centerforfiction.org.

2024 Honorees & Presenters

Honoring Patrick Chamoiseau
Lifetime of Excellence in Fiction Award
Introduced by Daniel Alarcón

Honoring Kathryn Belden
Medal for Editorial Excellence
Introduced by Jesmyn Ward

Honoring The Wild Robot
On Screen Award
Presented to Author Peter Brown
and Producer Jeff Hermann

Presenting the First Novel Prize
to One of the Seven Shortlisted Authors
Introduced by Tyriek White

Featuring Lisa Lucas
The Evening’s Emcee

The 2024 First Novel Prize Shortlist

Headshot
Rita Bullwinkel
Penguin Random House / Viking

The Fertile Earth
Ruthvika Rao
Macmillan / Flatiron Books

They Dream in Gold
Mai Sennaar
Zando / SJP Lit

Ask Me Again
Clare Sestanovich
Penguin Random House / Alfred A. Knopf

Fire Exit
Morgan Talty
Tin House

God Bless You, Otis Spunkmeyer
Joseph Earl Thomas
Hachette Book Group / Grand Central Publishing

Misinterpretation
Ledia Xhoga
Tin House

PATRICK CHAMOISEAU—winner of the Prix Goncourt, France’s most prestigious literary prize—is a Martinican novelist, poet, and essayist whose multifaceted and boundary-breaking oeuvre, including his masterwork Texaco, has been translated worldwide. One of the most important literary figures of the Caribbean, Chamoiseau explores Creole identity and relational poetics in his work.

DANIEL ALARCÓN is the author of four works of fiction, including The King Is Always Above the People, a 2017 finalist for the National Book Award. In 2022 he was awarded the Maria Moors Cabot prize, and in 2021 a MacArthur Fellowship. The host of Radio Ambulante, Alarcón writes about Latin America for the New Yorker.

KATHRYN BELDEN is Vice President and Editorial Director of Scribner. In her editorial career, she has shepherded some of the most consequential contemporary literature from manuscript to publication, including groundbreaking fiction by Mitchell S. Jackson, Kiese Laymon, Lisa See, Jesmyn Ward, and many others.

JESMYN WARD is the two-time National Book Award-winning author of Sing, Unburied, Sing and Salvage the Bones, as well as Let Us Descend, Where the Line Bleeds, and the memoir Men We Reaped. She has received the MacArthur Fellowship, Stegner Fellowship, and the Library of Congress Prize for American Fiction, among other honors.

THE WILD ROBOT is a story about survival, the meaning of home, and what happens when nature and technology collide. Peter Brown’s novel, published by Little, Brown Books for Young Readers (Hachette) in 2016, and this year’s film adaptation, produced by Jeff Hermann and directed by Chris Sanders for DreamWorks Animation (Universal), have captured the hearts, minds, and imaginations of readers and audiences around the world.

TYRIEK WHITE is the author of We Are a Haunting, winner of The Center for Fiction 2023 First Novel Prize. He has received fellowships from Callaloo, New York State Writers Institute, and Key West Literary Seminar, among other honors. He is currently the media director of Lampblack Literary Foundation.

LISA LUCAS is an arts administrator based in Brooklyn. She has previously served as Senior Vice President and Publisher of Pantheon and Schocken Books; Executive Director of the National Book Foundation; and Publisher of Guernica Magazine, following many years in the nonprofit sector. Lucas currently serves on the Board of Directors of the National Book Foundation and the National Council of Graywolf Books. 

2024 Benefit Host Committee

Thank You to Our 2024 Benefit Supporters