2024 Winners & Finalists

LIFETIME ACHIEVEMENT AWARD

Tony Grooms

BIOGRAPHY
Winner: The Ballad of Karla Faye Tucker by Mark Beaver
Finalist: Jumpman: The Making and Meaning of Michael Jordan by Johnny Smith

CHILDREN’S BOOK

Winner: You So Black by Theresa Tha Songbird

Finalist: Elodie Meets Guber the Ghost by P. E. Waring and Illustrated by Matea Anic

DETECTIVE/MYSTERY & SCIENCE FICTION
Winner: Murder in Drury Lane by Vanessa Riley
Finalist: Crypto: A John Wesley O'Toole Novel by William Rawlings

FIRST NOVEL
Winner: Red Clay Suzie by Jeffrey Dale Lofton
Finalist: The Bystanders by Dawn Major

HISTORY
Winner: Oconaluftee: The History of a Smoky Mountain Valley by Elizabeth Giddens
Finalist: Poor Atlanta: Poverty, Race, and the Limits of Sunbelt Development by LeeAnn Lands

INSPIRATIONAL
Winner: Captured By Love by Lee Ellis
Finalist: Hello Anxiety My Old Friend by Natalie Kohlaas

LITERARY FICTION & SHORT STORY COLLECTION
Winner: Bengal Hound by Rahad Abir, Edited by Kimberley Lim
Finalist: One Blood by Denene Millner

MEMOIR

Winner: More Than I Imagined: What a Black Man Discovered About the White Mother He Never Knew by John Blake

Finalist: The Way from Me to Us by Mike Coleman

POETRY CHAPBOOK

Winner: LIFE OF THE MIND by Julia Knowlton
Finalist: Cold Remembered: and other poems by David R. Altman

POETRY FULL-LENGTH BOOK
Winner: Tender Headed by Olatunde Osinaike
Finalist: The Anxiety Workbook by Christina Olson

ROMANCE
Winner: A Laird without a Past by Jeanine Englert
Finalist: Reunited with the Children's Doc by Susan Carlisle

SPECIALTY
Winner: Black on Black: On Our Resilience and Brilliance in America by Daniel Black
Finalist: Egg Rolls & Sweet Tea: Asian Inspired, Southern Style by Natalie Keng

YOUNG ADULT
Winner: Into the Light by Mark Oshiro
Finalist: Blood Debts by Terry J. Benton-Walker