Spring Book Awards Season in Bloom

Here's a recap of recent book award announcements.

The Boston Globe-Horn Book Awards

Presented annually since 1967, the Boston Globe-Horn Book Awards reward excellence in children's and young adult literature and are given in three categories: Fiction and Poetry, Nonfiction, and Picture Book.

The 2009 winners are:

• Fiction and Poetry: Nation by Terry Pratchett (HarperCollins)
• Nonfiction: The Lincolns: A Scrapbook Look at Abraham and Mary by Candace Fleming (Schwartz & Wade/Random House)
• Picture Book: Bubble Trouble by Margaret Mahy, illustrated by Polly Dunbar (Clarion)

More information and the full list of honor books are available on the Boston Globe-Horn Book website, www.hbook.com.

The Orange Prize for Fiction

The U.K.'s 2009 Orange Prize for Fiction has been awarded to novelist Marilynne Robinson for her novel Home (FSG), a follow-up to her Pulitzer Prize-winning Gilead. Established in 1996, the Orange Prize celebrates and promotes fiction by women and is awarded for the best novel of the year written by a woman in the English language, no matter the author's nationality.

Robinson was honored at a ceremony on Wednesday, June 3, at the Royal Festival Hall in London.

More information is available on the Orange Prize website, www.orangeprize.co.uk.

The 21st Annual Lambda Literary Awards

On Thursday, May 28, the Lambda Literary Foundation announced the winners of the Lambda Literary Awards, recognizing the best in LGBT books and authors.

Among this year's winners are:

• LGBT Nonfiction: Loving The Difficult by Jane Rule (Hedgerow Press)
• Bisexual: Open by Jenny Block (Seal Press)
• Transgender: Intersex (For Lack of a Better Word) by Thea Hillman (Manic D Press)
• Lesbian Debut Fiction: The Bruise by Magdalena Zurawski (Fiction Collective Two/University of Alabama Press)
• Gay Debut Fiction: Finlater by Shawn Ruff (Quote Editions)

The complete list of winners is available at www.lambdaliterary.org.

The Benjamin Franklin Awards Winners

The winners of the 21st annual Benjamin Franklin Awards, honoring excellence in independent publishing, were announced at a gala event at the Roosevelt Hotel in New York City on Thursday, May 28, in conjunction with BEA.

Among this year's winners are:

• Best Autobiography/Memoir: At the Elbows of My Elders: One Family's Journey Toward Civil Rights by Gail Milissa Grant (Missouri History Museum).
• Mystery/Suspense: Head Wounds by Chris Knopf (Permanent Press)
• The Bill Fisher Award for Best First Book -- Fiction: Stonewiser: The Heart of the Stone by Dora Machado (Mermaid Press)

A full list of award winners and finalists for the Benjamin Franklin Awards is available on the Independent Book Publishers Association website, www.ibpa-online.org.

ForeWord Announces 2008 Book of the Year Award Winners

ForeWord magazine announced the winners of the 2008 Book of the Year Awards and the Independent Publisher of the Year at a ceremony at BEA. Representing the best independently published books from 2008, 220 Book of the Year Award winners in 61 categories were honored.

Among the winners are:

• Editor's Choice Prize for Fiction: HomeSpun by Nilita Vachani (Other Press)
• Editor's Choice Prize for Nonfiction: American Earth: Environmental Writing Since Thoreau, edited by Bill McKibben (Library of America)
• Independent Publisher of the Year: The University of Nebraska Press

A full list of winners is available at www.forwardmagazine.com.