Submissions: Open | Deadline May 15, 2025

Crooks Corner Book Prize 11th Annual Longlist Announced

Crook's Corner Book Prize 9th Annual Longlist Announced

July 8, 2021

Chapel Hill, North Carolina—The Crook’s Corner Book Prize Foundation today announced its annual Longlist for best debut novel set in the American South. Now in its ninth year, the $5,000 literary prize winner will be announced in January 2022. The Longlist includes:

Conjure Women
by Afia Atakora
(Random House)

Lifelike Creatures
by  Rebecca Baum
(Regal House Publishing)

Every Bone A Prayer
by Ashley Blooms
(Sourcebooks Landmark)

Of Women and Salt
by Gabriela Garcia
(Flatiron Books)

F*CKFACE And Other Stories
by Leah Hampton
(Henry Holt & Co.)

The Prophets
by Robert Jones, Jr.
(G.P. Putnam’s Sons)

The Girls in the Stilt House
by Kelly Mustian
(Sourcebooks Landmark)

Things We Lost to the Water
by Eric Nguyen
(Alfred A. Knopf)

Lord the One You Love is Sick
by Kasey Thornton
(IG Publishing)

Follow Crook’s Corner Book Prize on Social Media
Website       Facebook      Twitter     Instagram
Use hashtag #crooksbooks21

12TH Annual SHORTLIST

12TH Annual Longlist

11TH ANNUAL BOOK PRIZE WINNER

The Old Place
by Bobby Finger
DOWNLOAD PRESS RELEASE

11th Annual Announcement Party

2024 Announcement Party at The Crunkleton— Winner Bobby Finger with this year’s judge Wiley Cash and CCBP president Anna Hayes

11th Annual Readers' Party

Author Jill McCorkle and Algonquin Books co-founder Shannon Ravenel join CCBP Readers attending this year’s Thank You party.

10TH ANNUAL BOOK PRIZE WINNER

Shadows of Pecan Hollow
by Caroline Frost
DOWNLOAD PRESS RELEASE

THE 10TH ANNUAL SHORTLIST

THE 9TH ANNUAL BOOK PRIZE WINNER

Things We Lost to the Water
by Eric Nguyen
DOWNLOAD PRESS RELEASE

 

HOSTED BY

THE 10TH ANNUAL BOOK PRIZE JUDGE

Ben Fountain was born in Chapel Hill and grew up in eastern North Carolina. His most recent book is Beautiful Country Burn Again, a narrative, with history, of the 2016 presidential election. He is also the author of the novel Billy Lynn’s Long Halftime Walk, which was adapted for film by three-time Oscar winner Ang Lee, and the short story collection Brief Encounters with Che Guevara.
More about Ben Fountain

THE 2021 BOOK PRIZE WINNER

LIBRARY PANEL

THE 2022 BOOK PRIZE JUDGE

Ron Rash is the author of the PEN/Faulkner finalist and New York Times bestselling novel Serena, in addition to the critically acclaimed novels The Risen, Above the Waterfall, The Cove, One Foot in Eden, Saints at the River, and The World Made Straight…
More about Ron Rash

THE 2020 BOOK PRIZE WINNER

Atlas of Reds and Blues

by Devi S. Laskar
Download THE PRESS RELEASE