January PrizeCAT

Audobon Photography Awards

January's category is long-running prizes. It's an opportunity to re-discover a lost classic, or to read the latest winner.

Nobel Prize in Literature International 1901 - present

Prix Goncourt France 1903 - present

Prix Femina France 1904 - present

Pulitzer Prize America 1918 - present
Pulitzer Prize for the Novel 1918-1947
Pulitzer Prize for Fiction 1948 - present
There are many other categories, including journalism and non-fiction.

Hawthornden Prize Britain 1919 - present

James Tait Black Memorial Prize Britain 1919 - present

Newbery Medal Children's Books, America 1922 - present

The list above shows prizes that have been running for over 100 years, but I'll leave it to you to decide what qualifies as long-running. Some other possibilities are:

Carnegie Medal, Britain, Children's books, 1936 - present
Governor General's Awards, Canada, Multiple categories, 1936 - present
Edgar Awards for Crime Fiction (and other related categories) 1946 - present
Dagger Awards for Crime Fiction 1955 - present
The Miles Franklin Award, Australia, 1957 - present

There will be overlap! Feel free to use the same prize for multiple categories. Further prize suggestions are welcome.

The Wiki

I've been planning to read The Home and the World by the Nobel prize-winner Rabindranath Tagore for a very long time. But then again, I might look for something a lot less demanding. I recommend the James Tait Black winner, Lady into Fox, which is short, witty and weird.

I have some options here, but I'm leaning towards Memoirs of a Midget by Walter de la Mare, which won the James Tait Black in 1921.

>2 pamelad: I was planning on The Home and the World as my Indian book for the 2023 GeoCAT but never got round to it. Now is its next chance.

>4 Robertgreaves: So was I!

I recently found a 1935 copy of Portrait of Clare by Francis Brett Young, which won the 1927 James Tait Black.
I also have Smoky the Cowhorse by Will James, which won the 1927 Newbery Medal.

So I would add the Newbery Medal to the list - 1921 to present and the Carnegie Medal for Writing - 1936 to present (not quite a hundred years, but close!) For those who like middle grade and/or young adult reading.

Looks like the Governor General's Award in Canada started in 1936. Not sure yet if that's what I'll look at.

Jayne's mention of the Newbery and Carnegie Medals might be more appealing to me. Or I'll probably look into the Edgar Award, as well.

>6 JayneCM: I've added them. Portrait of Clare was a lucky find - I was looking for a copy, but they're very expensive.

>7 LibraryCin: Added that one too. Many categories, including children's, in both French and English. The more choice you have, the harder it is to decide!

I don't know if 35 years is long enough to be considered 'long-running', but I'm going to assume it is and read Ed Yong's An Immense World, which recently won the 2023 Royal Society Trivedi book prize (the Trivedi bit is new, but the Royal Society has been giving a prize to a science book since 1988).

>8 pamelad: Thanks, Pam!

I hope I can finally get to Thomas Mann's The Magic Mountain, a Nobel winner.

>8 pamelad: Thanks! It was indeed a lucky find. I am always on the lookout for older prize winners that are out of print and nearly fainted when I saw this one for $1!

I've been planning to reread Crossing Places the first in the Ruth Galloway series by Elly Griffiths and I see it is on the Edgar Prize list, making it my read for January.

I’ll probably read The Elephant’s Journey by Nobel Prize winner José Saramago, who’s one of my favorite authors. But I might opt for Six Characters in Search of an Author by ‪Luigi Pirandello‬, also a Nobel laureate, because it’s a play and super-short.

I read From the Mixed-up Files of Mrs. Basil E. Frankweiler, a perfectly delightful Newbery winner I somehow missed out on during my childhood. (Possibly because there are no horses in it--my childhood chapter book reading skewed HEAVILY to the Black Stallion, Marguerite Henry's books, and the Little House and Narnia series, which while not horse books per se do have horses in them.)

I read H is for Hawk by Helen Macdonald. This book won 14 awards, amongst them being the Andrew Carnegie Medals for Excellence in Fiction and Nonfiction 2016.

I read Snow Country by Yasunari Kawabata, a Nobel prizewinner.

I read and enjoyed Catfishing on CatNet by Naomi Kritzer, which won the Edgar Award.

>18 antqueen: That's such a fun book!

>19 susanna.fraser: I expected to find it a fun way to pass the time (which is what I often want in an audiobook) but it drew me in a lot more than I thought it would. I kept finding reasons to listen to just a little bit more :)

I have read Atemschaukel by Herta Müller who received the Nobel Prize for Literature in 2009.

February PrizeCAT--A Prize from Your Own Country has now been posted.

I've finished Ed Yong's An Immense World, winner of the 2023 Royal Society Trivedi Science Book Prize. It was excellent.

I re-read The Witch of Blackbird Pond by Elizabeth George Speare for this month's challenge. The book won the Newberry Award in 1959.

I read The Night Watchman, which won the Pulitzer and has been on my TBR forever

I did a re-read of Barbarian Days which won the Pulitzer. It was a good read but I feel my not really being into the surfing scene lessened my enjoyment.

I read 1812: War with America by Jon Latimer, which also fit this month's HistoryCAT. It received the Society for Military History's Distinguished Book Award in 2008. The award was first given in 1987.

I read Six Characters in Search of an Author, a play by Luigi Pirandello, who won the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1934.

I finished Ursula LeGuin's The Dispossessed, which won the 1974 Hugo Best Novel award. The award was first given in 1953.

I finished 2021 Nebula Award winner Ring Shout.

I read Portrait of Clare, which won the 1927 James Tait Black Memorial Prize.

Edgar Award

Bluebird, Bluebird / Attica Locke
3.75 stars

Darren is a black man and a Texas Ranger. Though he is on suspension, he gets a tip that there have been two murders one county over – a black man and a white woman. Bodies found in the river a few days apart. Initially, he heads over just to see what things are looking like. Turns out there is an active chapter of the Aryan Brotherhood of Texas (a modern-day KKK) in this small town where there hasn’t been even one murder in decades. When he does get the go ahead from his Ranger supervisor to help investigate, the local sheriff isn’t thrilled.

I mostly liked this, but some of the flashbacks to previous happenings didn’t completely hold my interest. I liked Darren, but didn’t like some of the other characters much. I feel like dark and gritty are good words to describe this one. I do plan to continue with book 2 at some point.

I managed to finish Babbitt by Sinclair Lewis. Lewis won the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1930 based on his entire body of work. Babbitt was 'interesting' reading. Not something I can recommend unless you are looking for a scathing satire of 1920's middle-class America.