I am dumbstruck and elated to report that PEOPLE LIKE YOU was selected a Finalist in the PEN/Hemingway Award for first fiction.
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From the PEN/New England site:
FINALISTS
The two PEN/Hemingway Award finalists are S. M. Hulse for Black River (Houghton Mifflin Harcourt) and Margaret Malone for People Like You (Atelier26).
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Suddenly I find myself in the company of other past winners, finalists and honorable mentions… you know, authors like George Saunders, Edward P. Jones, Jhumpa Lahiri, Colson Whitehead, ZZ Packer, Jennifer Haigh, Marilynne Robinson, Ha Jin, Sherman Alexie, Junot Diaz, Yiyun Li, Lily King, Justin Cronin, Ben Fountain, Teju Cole, Mitchell S. Jackson, and many, many other mind-blowing writers.
Biggest of thanks to PEN New England and this year’s judges, Joshua Ferris, Alexandra Marshall, and Jay Parini.
And big, big congratulations to the winner Ottessa Moshfegh for her book EILEEN (Penguin), my co-Finalist S.M. Hulse for BLACK RIVER (Houghton Mifflin Harcourt), and honorable mention authors Karim Dimechkie for LIFTED BY THE GREAT NOTHING (Bloomsbury), and Chigozie Obioma for THE FISHERMEN (Little, Brown).
Lastly, never ending thanks to Atelier26 Books, the little engine that could, and Mark Allen Cunningham for making this impossible undreamed-of dream a reality.
To say I’m humbled doesn’t begin to do justice to what I feel today.