The Publishing Triangle, the association of LGBTQ+ people in publishing, today announced forty-one finalists for the 37th annual Publishing Triangle Awards, honoring the best LGBTQ+ books published in 2024. Included in the announcement are finalists in ten competitive categories, including the new Amber Hollibaugh Award for LGBTQ+ Social Justice Writing, and the winners of four other prestigious awards.
Winners in the ten competitive categories will be announced on Thursday, April 17 at an in-person ceremony beginning at 7:00 PM at the New School, 66 West 12th Street, New York City. The ceremony, which will be hosted by poet and activist Emanuel Xavier, will also be livestreamed, and a reception will follow. The awards ceremony and reception are both free and open to the public.
During the awards ceremony, The Publishing Triangle will also remember several iconic figures in LGBTQ+ publishing that passed away over the previous year, including 2024 Bill Whitehead Lifetime Achievement Award winner Dorothy Allison and Felice Picano, winner of the 1996 Ferro-Grumley Award for Literary Excellence.
Rabih Alameddine is the 2025 recipient of the Publishing Triangle’s Bill Whitehead Award for Lifetime Achievement. This award celebrates the recipient’s lifetime of work and commitment to fostering queer culture. The winner receives $3000, one of the largest cash prizes in LGBTQ+ letters.
Rabih Alameddine, self-described “grumpy cat lady,” is the author of the novels The Wrong End of the Telescope; The Angel of History; An Unnecessary Woman; The Hakawati; I, the Divine; and Koolaids, as well as the story collection The Perv and a teeny-tiny volume of criticism titled Comforting Myths. His books have been translated into more than 20 languages. His most recent awards include the 2019 Dos Passos Prize, the 2021 Lannan Prize for Fiction, and the 2022 Pen/Faulkner award. His upcoming novel, The True True Story of Raja the Gullible (and His Mother) comes out in September. He divides his time between his bedroom and his living room.
“The Whitehead Award judges were enthused about Rabih Alameddine’s impressive body of work,” said poet and writer Julie Enszer, a member of the panel. “His six novels, a short story collection, a volume of criticism, and his international reputation excited us. What is extraordinary about Alameddine’s work are his powerful imagination on the page and his attention to every single word and sentence. Rabih Alameddine is a master prose stylist channeling his gift into telling riveting stories about LGBTQ people for an international readership.”
Rabih Alameddine will be the 37th recipient of this prestigious award, which was first presented in 1989 to the writer Edmund White.
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Brittany Rogers is the winner of the Publishing Triangle’s Betty Berzon Emerging Writer Award, its prize for an LGBTQ writer who has published at least one book but not more than two. Her debut poetry collection, Good Dress (Tin House, 2024), is a non-traditional coming of age that explores the audacity of Black Detroit, Black womanhood, class, materialism, and matrilineage. She is also the author of numerous poems, essays, reviews, and anthologized pieces that have been published since 2016.
Lauren Melissa Ellzey, a novelist and member of the panel of judges, said, “Brittany Rogers’ work centers around a litany of poetry and essays, culminating in her debut manuscript — all of which showcases the prose of lived experience that resonates resolutely and necessarily with queer folks of all ages.“
The Betty Berzon Emerging Writer Award comes with a $1500 prize and is funded by Teresa DeCrescenzo, Dr. Berzon’s widow.
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The Publishing Triangle Torchbearer Award for 2025 will be presented to Trans formative Schools. The award, now in its third year, is given to organizations or individuals who strive to awaken, encourage, and support a love of reading, or to stimulate an interest in and an appreciation of LGBTQ literature.
Trans formative Schools supports trans futures by uplifting the lives of trans children, trans educators, and families touched by transness. They operate a free afterschool program designed to center the needs of trans, queer, nonbinary, and gender expansive students ages nine to fifteen, which is open and welcoming to all students. Among the classes offered through the afterschool program are many centered on the arts, including creative writing and queer media. Trans formative Schools isn’t stopping there. Their team is actively working towards launching a middle school.
“Trans formative Schools offers innovative, positive, and life-affirming programming for middle schoolers,” said Carol Rosenfeld, Chair of the Publishing Triangle. “At a time when many national leaders are scapegoating trans youth, and others are willing to throw them under the bus to distance themselves from controversy, Trans formative Schools is more important than ever. The Publishing Triangle is proud to stand up for the trans community, trans youth, and Trans formative Schools.”
The inaugural Torchbearer Award was presented in 2023 to Drag Story Hour NYC, and in 2024 the winner was Emily Drabinski, president of the American Library Association. It is funded by Rob Byrnes.
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This year’s Michele Karlsberg Leadership Award will be given to David Groff, a poet, editor, educator, and one of the original founders of The Publishing Triangle. This award is funded with the support of Michele Karlsberg, head of the eponymous marketing and publicity firm with an emphasis on members of the LGBTQ+ writing community.
“I have known David since 1990 and have had the privilege of witnessing his unwavering dedication to the LGBTQ literary community,” said Karlsberg. “He has always looked out for others, fostering an inclusive and supportive space for writers, readers, and industry professionals. David is not only a talented poet but also a steadfast advocate for community-building, bringing people together with his level-headed leadership and deep commitment to equity and visibility.
“His heart and soul have been invested in The Publishing Triangle since its inception—when we first gathered around a card table at the LGBTQ Community Center in New York City—surrounded by many literary greats we loved and lost. An award-winning literary figure, David has spent decades ensuring that LGBTQ voices are heard, celebrated, and uplifted. His contributions have shaped a more inclusive and vibrant literary world, making him profoundly deserving of this leadership award.
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Finalists for the Ferro-Grumley Award for LGBTQ Fiction, which is administered in conjunction with the Ferro-Grumley Foundation, are:
· Cinema Love, by Jiaming Tang (Dutton)
· Curiosities, by Anne Fleming (Knopf)
· Hart Island, by Gary Zebrun (University of Wisconsin Press)
· Indian Winter, by Kazim Ali (Coach House Books)
· There is a Rio Grande in Heaven, by Ruben Reyes Jr. (Mariner Books)
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Finalists for the Edmund White Award for Debut Fiction are:
· Cinema Love, by Jiaming Tang (Dutton)
· Grey Dog, by Elliott Gish (ECW Press)
· How to Fall in Love in a Time of Unnameable Disaster, by Muriel Leung (W. W. Norton & Company)
· A Thousand Times Before, by Asha Thanki (Viking)
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Finalists for the Judy Grahn Award for Lesbian Nonfiction are:
· My Withered Legs and Other Essays, by Sandra Gail Lambert (University of Georgia Press)
· A Place of Our Own: Six Spaces that Shaped Queer Women’s Culture, by June Thomas (Seal Press Hatchett Book Group)
· Something, Not Nothing: A Story of Grief and Love, by Sarah Leavitt (Arsenal Pulp Press)
· Survival Is a Promise: The Eternal Life of Audre Lorde, by Alexis Pauline Gumbs (Farrar, Straus and Giroux)
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Finalists for the Randy Shilts Award for Gay Nonfiction are:
· Christopher Isherwood Inside-Out, by Katherine Bucknell (Farrar, Straus and Giroux)
· The Scapegoat, by Lucy Hughes-Hallet (HarperCollins)
· Straight Acting: The Hidden Queer Lives of William Shakespeare, by Will Tosh (Seal Press, Hachette Book Group)
· Ten Bridges I’ve Burnt, by Brontez Purnell (MCD)
This award and the Judy Grahn Award for Lesbian Nonfiction are underwritten by Joseph Denneny, brother of Michael Denneny, the legendary gay editor who provided funding for the awards through the Shilts-Copyright Trust for many years until his death in 2023.
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Finalists for the Audre Lorde Award for Lesbian Poetry are:
· Alt-Nature, by Saretta Morgan (Coffee House Press)
· A Dream in Which I Am Playing with Bees, by RK Fauth (Texas Tech University Press)
· Song of My Softening, by Omotara James (Alice James Books)
· Your Dazzling Death, by Cass Donish (Knopf)
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Finalists for the Thom Gunn Award for Gay Poetry are:
· Bound, by Jubi Arriola-Headley (Persea Books)
· Pentimento, by Joshua Garcia (Black Lawrence Press)
· Rara Avis, by Blas Falconer (Four Way Books)
· Sky. Pond. Mouth., by Kevin McLellan (Yas Press)
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Finalists for the Leslie Feinberg Award for Trans and Gender-Variant Literature are:
· A Wounded Deer Leaps Highest, by Charlie J. Stephens (Torrey House Press)
· Dances of Time and Tenderness, by Julian Carter (Nightboat Books)
· El Ghourabaa: A Queer and Trans Collection of Oddities, by Samia Marshy and Eli Tareq El Bechelany-Lynch (eds) (Metonymy Press)
· I Don’t Want to be Understood, by Joshua Jennifer Espinoza (Alice James Books)
The award prize is funded by the author Daniel Handler (widely known by his pen name “Lemony Snicket”)
and his wife, the illustrator and writer Lisa Brown.
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Finalists for the Joseph Hansen Award for LGBTQ+ Crime Writing are:
· Behind You, by Catherine Hernandez (HarperCollins)
· Blessed Water, by Margot Douaihy (Zando/Gillian Flynn Books)
· Hart Island, by Gary Zebrun (University of Wisconsin Press)
· Rough Pages, by Lev AC Rosen (Forge Books)
The Joseph Hansen Award, now in its third year, was conceived by and is funded by popular mystery writer Michael Nava.
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Finalists for the Jacqueline Woodson Award for LGBTQ+ Young Adult and Children’s Literature are:
· Canto Contigo, by Jonny Garza Villa (Wednesday Books)
· Crash Landing, by Li Charmaine Anne (Annick Press)
· They Thought They Buried Us, by NoNieqa Ramos (Lerner Publishing Group)
· What I Must Tell the World: How Lorraine Hansberry Found Her Voice, by Leslie Jay and Loveis Wise (Zando-Hillman Grad Books)
This is the second year The Publishing Triangle has given an award for Young Adult and Children’s Literature. It is funded by Rob Byrnes.
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Finalists for the Amber Hollibaugh Award for LGBTQ+ Social Justice Writing are:
· Come By Here: A Memoir in Essays from Georgia’s Geechee Coast, by Neesha Powell-Ingabire (Hub City Press)
· How to Fuck Like a Girl: Essays, by Vera Blossom (DOPAMINE Books)
· How to Tell When We Will Die: On Pain, Disability and Doom, by Johanna Hedva (Zando-Hillman Grad Books)
· Magical Realism: Essays On Music, Memory, Fantasy and Borders, by Vanessa Angelica Villarreal (Tiny Reparations Books)
This is the first year the Publishing Triangle has presented the Amber Hollibaugh Award for LGBTQ+ Social Justice Writing to recognize a nonfiction book that addresses the issues such as economic injustice, with a special focus on queer kids and adult sex workers. Hollibaugh, who died in 2023, won the Judy Grahn Award for Lesbian Nonfiction in 2001 for her book, My Dangerous Desires: A Queer Girl Dreaming Her Way Home.