American Library in Paris Book Award
American Library in Paris Book Award was created in 2013 with a donation from the Florence Gould Foundation. It is awarded each November with a remunerative prize of $5,000 to "a work written originally in English that deepens and stimulates our understanding of France or the French.."[1]
The American Library in Paris "was founded and originally run by American expatriates in Paris in 1920, with books that had been sent by American libraries to soldiers fighting in World War I."[2]
Honorees
2013
The shortlist was announced in September,[3] and the winner in December 2013.[2]
Winner: Fredrik Logevall, Embers of War: The Fall of an Empire and the Making of America's Vietnam
Shortlist:
- Simon van Booy, The Illusion of Separateness
- Alex Danchev, Cezanne: A Life (about Paul Cézanne)
- Tom Reiss, The Black Count: Glory, Revolution, Betrayal, and the Real Count of Monte Cristo
- Marilyn Yalom, How the French Invented Love
Jury: Diane Johnson, Adam Gopnik and Julian Barnes
2014
The shortlist was announced in July, and the winner in November 2014.[4]
Winner: Robert Harris, An Officer and a Spy
Shortlist:
- Jonathan Beckman, How to Ruin a Queen: Marie Antoinette, the Stolen Diamonds and the Scandal that Shook the French Throne
- Frederick Brown, The Embrace of Unreason: France 1914 - 1940
- Sean B. Carroll, Brave Genius: A Scientist, a Philosopher, and their Daring Adventures from the French Resistance to the Nobel Prize
- Philip Dwyer, Citizen Emperor: Napoleon in Power 1799 - 1815
- Francine Prose, Lovers at the Chameleon Club, Paris 1932
Jury: Alice Kaplan, Sebastian Faulks, and Pierre Assouline
2015
The shortlist was announced in July,[5] and the winner was announced 6 November 2015.
Winner: Laura Auricchio, The Marquis: Lafayette Reconsidered
Shortlist:
- Nancy L. Green, The Other Americans in Paris: Businessmen, Countesses, Wayward Youth 1880-1941
- Richard C. Keller, Fatal Isolation: The Devastating Paris Heat Wave of 2003
- Sue Roe, In Montmartre: Picasso, Matisse, and Modernism in Paris, 1900-1910
- Ronald Rosbottom, When Paris Went Dark: The City of Light Under German Occupation 1940-1944
Jury: Laura Furman, Lily Tuck, Fredrik Logevall
2016
The shortlist was announced in July, and the winner was announced on 3 November 2016.[6]
Winner: Ethan B. Katz, The Burdens of Brotherhood: Jews and Muslims from North Africa to France
Shortlist:
- Jo Baker, A Country Road, A Tree
- Sarah Bakewell, At the Existentialist Café: Freedom, Being, and Apricot Cocktails
- Julie Barlow and Jean-Benoît Nadeau, The Bonjour Effect: The Secret Codes of French Conversation Revealed
- David Drake, Paris at War: 1939-1944
- Luc Sante, The Other Paris
Jury: Laura Auricchio, Robert Harris, Robert O. Paxton
2017
The shortlist was announced in July,[7] and the winner was announced on 3 November 2017.[8]
Winner: David Bellos, The Novel of the Century: The Extraordinary Adventure of Les Misérables
Shortlist:
- David McAninch, Duck Season: Eating, Drinking, and Other Misadventures in Gascony, France's Last Best Place
- Adam Gidwitz, The Inquisitor's Tale: or, The Three Magical Children and Their Holy Dog
- Ross King, Mad Enchantment: Claude Monet and the Painting of the Water Lilies
- Nadja Spiegelman, I'm Supposed to Protect You From All This: A Memoir
- Susan Rubin Suleiman, The Némirovksy Question: The Life, Death, and Legacy of a Jewish Writer in Twentieth-Century France
Jury: Adam Gopnik, Bruno Racine, Stacy Schiff
2018
The shortlist was announced in July, and the winner was announced on 8 November 2018.
Winner: Julian Jackson, A Certain Idea of France: The Life of Charles de Gaulle
Shortlist
- Adam Begley, The Great Nadar: The Man Behind the Camera
- Bijan Omrani, Caesar’s Footprints: A Cultural Excursion to Ancient France: Journeys Through Roman Gaul
- Rupert Thomson, Never Anyone But You
- Caroline Weber, Proust’s Duchess: How Three Celebrated Women Captured the Imagination of Fin-de-Siècle Paris
Jury: Diane Johnson, David Bellos, and Pierre Assouline
2019
The shortlist was announced in July, and the winner was announced on 7 November 2019.[9]
Winner: Marc Weitzmann, Hate: The Rising Tide of Anti-Semitism in France (and What it Means for Us)
Shortlist
- Edward Carey, Little: A Novel
- Andrew S. Curran, Diderot and the Art of Thinking Freely
- David Elliott, Voices: The Final Hours of Joan of Arc
- Stéphane Hénaut and Jeni Mitchell, A Bite-Sized History of France: Gastronomic Tales of Revolution, War, and Enlightenment
- Julie Orringer, The Flight Portfolio: A Novel
Jury: Alice Kaplan, Thomas Chatterton Williams, and Pamela Druckerman
Coups de coeur
In addition to the six shortlisted titles, the screening committee selected the following five books as worthy of special recognition:
- Mark Braude, The Invisible Emperor: Napoleon on Elba from Exile to Escape
- Peter Caddick-Adams, Sand and Steel: The D-Day Invasion and the Liberation of France
- Christopher L. Miller, Impostors: Literary Hoaxes and Cultural Authenticity
- Whitney Scharer, The Age of Light: A Novel
- Christopher Tilghman, Thomas and Beal in the Midi
References
- "American Library in Paris Book Award 2019 winner | American Library in Paris". Retrieved 2019-11-08.
- Allan Kozinn (November 18, 2013). "New Prize Goes to Author of Book on Vietnam". The New York Times. Retrieved December 2, 2013.
- "The American Library in Paris Book Award Shortlist" Archived 2013-12-04 at the Wayback Machine. The American Library in Paris Book Award Archived 2013-03-12 at the Wayback Machine. The American Library in Paris. September 2013.
- "The American Library in Paris 2014 book award winner announcement". American Library in Paris. 3 November 2014. Archived from the original on 29 November 2014. Retrieved 20 November 2014.
- "The 2015 Book Award Shortlist". American Library in Paris Book Award. Archived from the original on November 7, 2015. Retrieved December 5, 2015.
- "American Library in Paris Book Award 2019 winner | American Library in Paris". Retrieved 2019-11-08.
- "The 2017 Library Book Award shortlist announced". American Library in Paris Book Award. 4 July 2017. Archived from the original on 14 September 2017. Retrieved 13 September 2017.
- "The 2017 American Library in Paris Book Award goes to The Novel of the Century" (Press release). American Library in Paris. Google Drive. 2017-11-03. Retrieved 2018-01-03.
- "American Library in Paris Book Award 2019 winner | American Library in Paris". Retrieved 2019-11-08.
External links
- American Library in Paris Book Award, official website