Skip to main content

The Townsend Prize Finalists

 The finalists for the 2025 Prize:

Denene Millner, One Blood (Forge Books, 9.5.23) AA

Chika Unigwe, The Middle Daughter (Dzanc Books, 4.4.23) AA

Anissa Gray, Life and Other Love Songs (Berkley, Penguin, 4.11.23) black and gay

Julia Franks, The Say So (Hub City Press, 6.6.23) white

Ra’Niqua Lee, For What Ails You (ELJ Editions, 11.6.23) black

John M Williams, End Times (Sartoris Literary Group, 9.15.23)

Gordon Johnston, Seven Islands of the Ocmulgee: River Stories (Mercer UP, 2.7.23)

Kimberly Brock, The Fabled Earth (Harper Muse, 10.1.24)

Peter Selgin, A Boy’s Guide to Outer Space (Regal House Publishing, 11.12.24)

Barbara Tucker, Lying In (Colorful Crow Publishing, 5.15.24)

 The placement of my name last convinces me I am the dark horse; I just made the cut.  I am from the smallest press, have no New York Times Bestsellers, garnered only a handful of Amazon reviews and sales, and am essentially a nobody in literary circles. But, I did make the cut.  Something put me in this group when the other nominees weren't. So, I go to the dinner and see someone else win, but I also know this writing gig is one for me and some folks who don't know me appreciated my book. 

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Birdwatching

 Whose world is this, anyway? My husband came out to the deck where I was reading, thinking, and taking long pauses to listen to birds and watch them visit the feeders. Nala and Butter were keeping the the squirrels away. The cardinals, like kings, were making sure they were fed first but wrens, sparrows, finches, robins, swifts sat in the trees calling and cackling. My Cornell Labs app has identified 18 in 18 minutes, some new ones included. “How interesting that God made all the birds have distinctive calls,” I said. “But I guess they are calling to their own kind, their mate and children.” “Do you think they are talking to each other?” he said. “Not like we do, no communicating, but signaling.” “I thought they were singing for us.” We laughed about that; our human-centric, self-centered view of things takes over. “They sing and make noises when we are not here, so it’s not for us. If they are singing for anyone, it’s God.” I had read Samuel’s speech to the nation in I Samuel 12,...
Post a Comment
Read more

Keeping Up Appearances? David's Surprise Anointing to Be King

  Have you ever watched the show, Keeping Up Appearances? What it is. A comedy about a British woman who wants to be thought of as very high class even though her family is low class. Her name is Hyacinth Bucket but she pronounces it Bouquet. She wants everything perfect but her family works against her, and her neighbors run from her. We all know someone who wants to keep up appearances, and sometimes we do. In our everyday life, we depend on our eyes and we automatically trust them, at least at first, and we often don’t look closely or below the surface. Like puzzles. But we know that appearances can be deceiving, even though they catch us. So I wanted to show this video I saw recently because it’s disturbing but informative. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FERa1AI2EK8 AI has gotten far better on making these deep fakes—videos that are not of anyone but totally generated by the software. Even though they look like someone, they are not. Of course, it is stealing fro...
Post a Comment
Read more