Los Angeles Times Book Prize: fiction

The Los Angeles Times has honored books annually since 1980. Currently, it does so in many categories that include, among others, biography, current interest, fiction, history, mystery/thriller, poetry, science and technology, and young adult fiction. Works are eligible regardless of the language in which they were originally published, but not until the year of their first U.S. publication in English.  The prizes are normally presented before the start of the Los Angeles Times Festival of Books, another annual event sponsored by the newspaper.

2023: Same Bed Different Dreams: A Novel, by Ed Park

2022: Solenoid, by Mircea Cartarescu

2021: In the Company of Men, by Véronique Tadjo

2020: At Night All Blood Is Black, by David Diop (Anna Moschovakis, translator)

2019: The Topeka School: A Novel, by Ben Lerner

2018: The Great Believers: A Novel, by Rebecca Makkai

2017: Exit West, by Mohsin Hamid

2016: Imagine Me Gone, by Adam Haslett

2015: The Story of My Teeth, by Valeria Luiselli

2014: The Blazing World, by Siri Hustvedt

2013: A Tale for the Time Being, by Ruth Ozeki

2012: Billy Lynn's Long Halftime Walk, by Ben Fountain

2011: Luminarium, by Alex Shakar

2010: A Visit from the Goon Squad, by Jennifer Egan

2009: A Happy Marriage, by Rafael Yglesias

2008: Home, by Marilynne Robinson

2007: Be Near Me, by Andrew O’Hagan

2006: A Woman in Jerusalem, by A. B. Yehoshua

2005: Memories of My Melancholy Whores, by Gabriel García Márquez

2004: The Master, by Colm Tóibín

2003: Train: A Novel, by Pete Dexter

2002: Atonement: A Novel, by Ian McEwan

2001: Why Did I Ever, by Mary Robison

2000: Assorted Fire Events: Stories, by David Means

1999: Freedom Song: Three Novels, by Amit Chaudhuri

1998: The Rings of Saturn, by W.G. Seabed

1997: In the Rogue Blood, by James Carlos Blake

1996: A Fine Balance, by Rohinton Mistry

1995: The Blue Afternoon, by William Boyd

1994: Remembering Babylon, by David Malouf

1993: Pigs in Heaven, by Barbara Kingsolver

1992: Maus II, A Survivor's Tale: And Here My Troubles Began, by Art Spiegelman

1991: White People, by Allan Gurganus

1990: Lantern Slides, by Edna O’Brien

1989: The Heart of the Country, by Fay Weldon

1988: Love in the Time of Cholera, by Gabriel García Marquez

1987: Fools Crow, by James Welch

1986: The Handmaid's Tale, by Margaret Atwood

1985: Love Medicine, by Louise Erdrich

1984: The Unbearable Lightness of Being, by Milan Kundera

1983: Schindler's Ark, by Thomas Keneally

1982: A Flag for Sunrise, by Robert Stone

1981: The White Hotel, by D.M. Thomas

1980: The Second Coming, by Walker Percy

The Biblio File: images of N.E. libraries, for bibliophiles

Little Free Library, Portsmouth,Rhode Island

David Levine on writers: Philip Roth

David Levine (1926-2009) was one of America’s most prominent illustrators during a career that spanned decades. No less an authority than Jules Feiffer described him as "the greatest caricaturist of the last half of the 20th century,” although Levine continued to work in the early years of this century as well. Levine’s subjects included himself (above) and people from many walks of life. Authors, scribes and scribblers were a big part of the mix, as these caricatures make clear. 

Lit Toons: Cartoons with a bookish bent

First Lines: Gillian Flynn

When I think of my wife, I always think of her head.

Gone Girl

Gillian Flynn

"They say it's your birthday" - writers born on April 24

Eric Bogosian  (1953)
Elizabeth Goudge  (1900)

Sue Grafton  (1940)
Karan Mahajan  (1984)

David Morrell  (1943) 
Gabriel Okara  (1921)
George Oppen  (1908)

Carl Spitteler  (1845) 

Anthony Trollope  (1815) 

Robert Penn Warren  (1905)

Los Angeles Times Book Prize: young adult fiction

The Los Angeles Times has honored books annually since 1980. Currently, it does so in many categories that include, among others, biography, current interest, fiction, history, mystery/thriller, poetry, science and technology, and young adult fiction. Works are eligible regardless of the language in which they were originally published, but not until the year of their first U.S. publication in English.  The prizes are normally presented before the start of the Los Angeles Times Festival of Books, another annual event sponsored by the newspaper.

2023: Gone Wolf, by Amber McBride

2022: Torch, by Lyn Miller-Lachmann

2021: A Sitting in St. James, by Rita Williams-Garcia

2020: Punching the Air, by Ibi Zoboi and Yusef Salaam

2019: When the Ground Is Hard, by Malla Nunn

2018: The Poet X, by Elizabeth Acevedo

2017: Long Way Down, by Jason Reynolds

2016: The Lie Tree, by Frances Hardinge

2015: My Seneca Village, by Marilyn Nelson

2014: The Family Romanov: Murder, Rebellion, and the Fall of Imperial Russia, by Candace Fleming

2013: Boxers and Saints, by Gene Luen Yang

2012: Ask the Passengers, by A.S. King

2011: The Big Crunch, by Pete Hartman

2010: A Conspiracy of Kings, by Megan Whalen Turner

2009: Marching for Freedom: Walk Together Children and Don’t You Grow Weary, by Elizabeth Partridge

2008: Nation, by Terry Pratchett

2007: A Darkling Plain, by Philip Reeve

2006: Tyrell, by Coe Booth

2005: You & You & You, by Per Nilsson

2004: Doing It, by Melvin Burgess

2003: A Northern Light, by Jennifer Donnelly

2002: Feed, by M.T. Anderson

2001: The Land, by Mildred D. Taylor

2000: Miracle's Boys, by Jacqueline Woodson

1999: Frenchtown Summer, by Robert Cormier

1998: Rules of the Road, by Joan Bauer
 

The Biblio File: images of cover art, for bibliophiles

David Levine on writers: Federico Garcia Lorca

David Levine (1926-2009) was one of America’s most prominent illustrators during a career that spanned decades. No less an authority than Jules Feiffer described him as "the greatest caricaturist of the last half of the 20th century,” although Levine continued to work in the early years of this century as well. Levine’s subjects included himself (above) and people from many walks of life. Authors, scribes and scribblers were a big part of the mix, as these caricatures make clear.  

Lit Toons: Cartoons with a bookish bent