The Flannery O'Connor Award for Short Fiction is an annual prize awarded by the
University of Georgia Press
The University of Georgia Press or UGA Press is the university press of the University of Georgia, a public land-grant research university with its main campus in Athens, Georgia. It is the oldest and largest publishing house in Georgia and a me ...
in to a North American writer in a blind-judging contest for a collection of English language short stories.
The collection is subsequently published by the
University of Georgia Press
The University of Georgia Press or UGA Press is the university press of the University of Georgia, a public land-grant research university with its main campus in Athens, Georgia. It is the oldest and largest publishing house in Georgia and a me ...
. The prize is named in honor of the American short story writer and novelist
Flannery O'Connor
Mary Flannery O'Connor (March 25, 1925August 3, 1964) was an American novelist, short story writer, and essayist. She wrote two novels and 31 short stories, as well as a number of reviews and commentaries.
O'Connor was a Southern writer who of ...
.
The prize was established in 1983 and has since published more than seventy collections. Originally, the prize was awarded annually to two winners for a collection of
short stories
A short story is a piece of prose fiction. It can typically be read in a single sitting and focuses on a self-contained incident or series of linked incidents, with the intent of evoking a single effect or mood. The short story is one of the old ...
or
novella
A novella is a narrative prose fiction whose length is shorter than most novels, but longer than most novelettes and short stories. The English word ''novella'' derives from the Italian meaning a short story related to true (or apparently so) ...
s. Starting in 2016, there has only been one winner per competition cycle.
Winners
* 1983
David Walton for ''Evening Out''
* 1983
Leigh Allison Wilson for ''From the Bottom Up''
* 1984
Mary Hood for ''How Far She Went''
* 1984
Sandra Thompson for ''Close-Ups''
* 1984
Susan Neville for ''The Invention of Flight''
* 1985
Daniel Curley ''Living with Snakes''
* 1985
François Camoin for ''Why Men are Afraid of Women''
* 1985
Molly Giles
Molly Giles (born in 1942) is an American short story writer, novelist, and professor at the University of Arkansas. She formerly taught at San Francisco State University. She is the author of ''Creek Walk and Other Stories'' () published in 1997 a ...
for ''Rough Translations''
* 1986
Peter Meinke for ''The Piano Tuner''
* 1986
Tony Ardizzone for ''
The Evening News''
* 1987
Melissa Pritchard for ''Spirit Seizures''
* 1987
Salvatore La Puma for ''The Boys of Bensonhurst''
* 1988
Gail Galloway Adams for ''The Purchase of Order''
* 1988
Philip F. Deaver for ''Silent Retreats''
* 1989
Carol L. Glickfeld for ''Useful Gifts''
* 1990
Antonya Nelson
Antonya Nelson (born January 6, 1961) is an American author and teacher of creative writing who writes primarily short stories.
Life and education
Antonya Nelson was born January 6, 1961, in Wichita, Kansas.
She received a BA degree from the U ...
for ''The Expendables''
* 1990
Debra Monroe
Debra Monroe is an American novelist, short story writer, memoirist, and essayist. She has written seven books, including two story collections, a collection of essays, two novels, and two memoirs, and is also editor of an anthology of nonfiction ...
for ''The Source of Trouble''
* 1990
Nancy Zafris for ''The People I Know''
* 1991
Robert H. Abel for ''Ghost Traps''
* 1991
T. M. McNally for ''Low flying Aircraft''
* 1992
Alfred DePew for ''The Melancholy of Departure''
* 1992
Dennis Hathaway for ''The Consequences of Desire''
* 1993
Alyce Miller for ''The Nature of Longing''
* 1993
Dianne Nelson for ''A Brief History of Male Nudes in America''
* 1995
C. M. Mayo for ''Sky Over El Nido''
* 1996
Ha Jin
Jin Xuefei (; born February 21, 1956) is a Chinese American poet and novelist who uses the pen name Ha Jin (). The name ''Ha'' comes from his favorite city, Harbin. His poetry is associated with the Misty Poetry movement.
Early life, educatio ...
for ''Under the Red Flag''
* 1996
Paul Rawlins for ''No Lie Like Love''
* 1996
Wendy Brenner for ''Large Animals in Everyday Life''
* 1998
Frank Soos
Frank Soos (1950 – August 18, 2021) was an American short story writer.
Life
Soos grew up in Pocahontas, Virginia.
He graduated from Davidson College in 1972 and the University of Arkansas.
He taught at University of Alaska Fairbanks.
His work ...
for ''Unified Field Theory''
* 1999
Hester Kaplan for ''The Edge of Marriage''
* 1999
Mary Clyde for ''Survival Rates''
* 2000 Robert Anderson for ''Ice Age''
* 2000
Darrell Spencer for ''Caution: Men in Trees''
* 2001
Bill Roorbach
William Roorbach (born August 8, 1953) is an American novelist, short story and nature writer, memoirist, journalist, blogger and critic. He has authored fiction and nonfiction works including ''Big Bend,'' which won the Flannery O'Connor Awar ...
for ''Big Bend''
* 2001
Dana Johnson for ''Break Any Woman Down''
* 2002
Kellie Wells for ''Compression Scars''
* 2002
Rita Ciresi for ''Mother Rocket''
* 2003
Catherine Brady for ''Curled in the Bed of Love''
* 2003
Ed Allen for ''Ate It Anyway''
* 2004 No award (award to
Brad Vice
Brad Vice (born November 14, 1973) is an English language and composition professor at the University of West Bohemia. He grew up in Alabama. His short story collection, ''The Bear Bryant Funeral Train'', won the Flannery O'Connor Award for Shor ...
rescinded due to a plagiarism scandal)
* 2005
David Crouse for
''Copy Cats''
* 2006
Greg Downs
Gregory Downs (born 13 December 1958) is an English former professional footballer. Originally a centre-forward, he switched to left full-back early in his career.
Downs began his career with Norwich City where he was player of the year in 19 ...
for ''Spit Baths''
* 2007
Anne Panning for ''
Super America''
* 2007
Margot Singer for ''The Pale of Settlement''
* 2007
Peter LaSalle for ''Tell Borges If You See Him''
* 2008
Andrew J. Porter for ''The Theory of Light and Matter''
* 2008
Peter Selgin
Peter Selgin (; born 1957) is an American novelist, short story writer, playwright, essayist, editor, and illustrator. Selgin is Associate Professor of English at Georgia College & State University in Milledgeville, Georgia.
Biography
The son of ...
for ''Drowning Lessons''
* 2009
Geoffrey Becker for ''Black Elvis''
* 2009
Lori Ostlund ''The Bigness of the World''
* 2010
Jessica Treadway for ''Please Come Back to Me''
* 2010
Linda L. Grover for ''The Dance Boots''
* 2011
Amina Gautier for ''At-Risk''
* 2011
Melinda Moustakis for ''Bear Down, Bear North: Alaska Stories''
* 2012
E.J. Levy for ''Love, In Theory''
* 2012
Hugh Sheehy for ''The Invisibles''
* 2013
Jacqueline Gorman for ''The Viewing Room''
* 2013
Tom Kealey for ''Thieves I've Known''
* 2014
Karin Lin-Greenberg for ''Faulty Predictions''
* 2014
Monica McFawn for ''Bright Shards of Someplace Else''
* 2014
Toni Graham for ''The Suicide Club''
* 2015
Anne Raeff for ''The Jungle Around Us''
* 2015
Lisa Graley for ''The Current that Carries''
* 2016
Becky Mandelbaum for ''Bad Kansas''
* 2017
Kirsten Sundberg Lunstrum for ''What We Do With the Wreckage''
* 2018
Colette Sartor for ''Once Removed''
* 2019
Patrick Earl Ryan for ''If We Were Electric''
* 2020
Kate McIntyre for ''Mad Prairie''
* 2021
Toni Ann Johnson for ''Light Skin Gone to Waste''
* 2022
Carol Roh Spaulding for ''Waiting for Mr. Kim and Other Stories''
* 2023 Iheoma Nwachukwu for ''Japa and Other Stories''
* 2024 A. Muia for ''A Desert Between Two Seas''
Finalists
* 2009
Scott Elliott for ''Arrangements''
See also
*
List of American literary awards
References
External links
*
{{Works by Flannery O'Connor, state=collapsed
University of Georgia
Awards established in 1983
Short story awards
Novella awards
American fiction awards
Flannery O'Connor