Washington State Book Award winners for 2024

Timothy Egan, from Seattle, and Rena Priest, of Lummi Nation, are among the winners of the 2024 Washington State Book Awards.

Egan’s “A Fever in the Heartland: The Ku Klux Klan’s Plot to Take Over America, and the Woman Who Stopped Them” won in general nonfiction/biography. Priest won in poetry for editing “I Sing the Salmon Home: Poems from Washington State.”

Matika Wilbur of Swinomish and Tulalip was a general nonfiction/biography finalist for her “Project 562: Changing the Way We See Native America.”

Other winners in the seven categories are Jane Wong, “Meet Me Tonight in Atlantic City,” creative nonfiction/memoir; Sonora Jha, “The Laughter,” fiction; Ben Clanton and Andy Chou Musser, “Ploof,” picture books; Jessixa Bagley, with illustrations by Aaron Bagley, “Duel,” books for young readers; and Margaret Owen, “Painted Devils,” young adult literature.

The Washington State Book Awards are presented by the Washington Center for the Book (an affiliate of the Library of Congress Center for the Book administered by Washington State Library, a division of the Office of the Secretary of State).

Sara Peté, director of the Washington Center for the Book, administered the awards, which honor outstanding books published by Washington authors in 2023.

Awards are based on the strength of the publication’s literary merit, lasting importance and overall quality to authors who are current state residents. Judges read and evaluated 292 books.

This is the 58th year of the program, formerly called the Governor’s Writers Awards.

Winners were announced in September.

Judges 2024 finalists and information: washingtoncenterforthebook.org.

Source: Washington Center for the Book