Celebrate the 2024 Nebraska Book Award winners with author readings and an awards ceremony at the Nebraska Celebration of Book (NCOB) literary festival. The 2024 Nebraska Book Award winners will be honored on October 12 at the UNL City Campus Union. The celebration will include an author panel during the festival and the awards ceremony immediately afterward at 3:30 p.m. The ceremony will feature readings from some of the winning authors, designers and illustrators of Nebraska-related books published in 2023. And the winners are:
Children’s picture book: Ted Kooser: More than a local miracle written by Carla Ketner, illustrated by Paula Wallace. Publisher: University of Nebraska Press.
Children’s novel: The Adventures of Pearl and Monty: The Bait and the Switch by E. Adams. Publisher: Jade Forest Publishing.
Young adult novel: The unstoppable Bridget Bloom by Allison L. Bitz. Publisher: HarperTeen.
Cover and design: Feisty Righty: A Cancer Survivor’s Journey by Jennifer D. James,
Cover artwork by Courtney Keller. Publisher: Self-published.
Design Award: Horizons by Julie S. Paschold. Publisher: Atmosphere Press.
Fiction: The war begins in Paris: A novel by Theodore Wheeler. Publisher: Little, Brown and Company.
Non-fiction Nebraska as a place: Field guide for a hybrid landscape by Dana Fritz.
Publisher: Bison Books.
Non-fiction history: The first migrants Richard Edwards and Jacob K. Friefeld. Publisher: Bison Books.
Poetry: The Gathering of Bastards by Romeo Oriogun. Publisher: University of Nebraska Press.
Poetry Honor: The Book Eaters by Carolina Hotchandani. Publisher: Perugia Press.
The Book Awards Celebration is being combined with the Nebraska Book Festival this year and is called “The Nebraska Celebration of Books,” which is designed to celebrate Nebraska’s literary heritage and contemporary authors. The event will be held on Saturday, October 12th from 10:00 a.m. to 4:30 p.m. on the second floor of the UNL City Campus Union in the Regency Suite, Heritage Room and Swanson Auditorium and will recognize the 20th anniversary of the One Book One Nebraska program with a panel discussion of past authors. In addition, there will be Nebraska authors featured, a SLAM poetry showcase, book vendors and the presentation of the Nebraska Center for the Book’s Nebraska Book Awards, the Mildred Bennett Award, the Jane Geske Award and the announcement of One Book One Nebraska for 2025.
The One Book One Nebraska selection 2024, Dance with the Octopus: The Memory of a Crime by Debora Harding (Bloomsbury Publishing, 2020) will be presented in a memoir writing workshop led by Lucy Adkins of Larksong Writers Place.
The Nebraska Book Awards are sponsored and supported by the Nebraska Center for the Book and the Nebraska Library Commission.
The Nebraska Center for the Book is affiliated with the Nebraska Library Commission and brings together the state’s readers, authors, booksellers, librarians, publishers, printers, educators and scholars to build the book community and support programs that promote and stimulate public interest in books, reading and the written word. The Nebraska Center for the Book is supported by the national Center for the Book in the Library of Congress and the Nebraska Library Commission.
As the state library authority, the Nebraska Library Commission represents the library and information needs of all Nebraskans. The mission of the Library Commission is to promote, develop and coordinate library and information services statewide to “bring people and information together.”
Host sponsors of the Nebraska Celebration of Books (NCOB) include the Nebraska Center for the Book, Nebraska Library Commission, University of Nebraska Press, Lincoln City Libraries, and Francie and Finch Bookshop. Supporting sponsors currently include Outskirts Press, KZUM 89.3FM, and Concierge Marketing. Humanities Nebraska supports the One Book One Nebraska program.
