Douglas Stuart, Isabel Wilkerson, and Louise Erdrich are among the finalists for the 2021 Dayton Literary Peace Prize.
The Dayton Literary Peace Prize Foundation announced the 12 finalists for the award, which is given each year in two categories, fiction and nonfiction, to books “that have led readers to a better understanding of other cultures, peoples, religions, and political points of view.”
Stuart’s Booker Prize–winning Shuggie Bain was named a finalist in the fiction category along with Erdrich’s The Night Watchman, which won this year’s Pulitzer Prize. Also making the cut were James McBride’s Deacon King Kong, Nguyễn Phan Quế Mai’s The Mountains Sing, Elizabeth Wetmore’s Valentine, and Alexander Starritt’s We Germans. Shuggie Bain and Deacon King Kong were finalists for last year’s Kirkus Prize.
Wilkerson’s Caste: The Origins of Our Discontents, a finalist for the Kirkus Prize and National Book Critics Circle Award, made the shortlist for the nonfiction award, along with Toni Jensen’s Carry: A Memoir of Survival on Stolen Land, Valarie Kaur’s See No Stranger: A Memoir and Manifesto of Revolutionary Love, Michele Harper’s The Beauty in Breaking, Jordan Ritter’s The Road From Raqqa: A Story of Brotherhood, Borders, and Belonging, and Ariana Neumann’s When Time Stopped: A Memoir of My Father’s War and What Remains.
The Dayton Literary Peace Prize was first awarded in 2006. Past winners have included Viet Thanh Nguyen’s The Sympathizer, Edwidge Danticat’s Brother, I’m Dying, and Ta-Nehisi Coates’ We Were Eight Years in Power.
The winners of this year’s prizes will be announced on Sept. 22.
Michael Schaub is a Texas-based journalist and regular contributor to NPR.
