BOA Blog

These past few months have been a whirlwind of exciting awards news for BOA authors and titles! On Friday, October 23, poet Geffrey Davis (Revising the Storm, 2014) attended the 2015 Hurston/Wright Legacy Award ceremony in Washington, DC, where he was honored with the 2015 Hurston/Wright Finalist Award for poetry. Only one winner and one finalist were selected for each category. The 2015 poetry judges were Chris Abani, Alison Joseph, and Monica Hand. Here is what they have to say about Revising the Storm: "A finely wright meditative collection that calls to mind poets such as Carl Phillips and Jay Wright—yet,...

Library Journal has named Nickole Brown's Fanny Says a Best Book of 2015 for Poetry! According to LJ Editor Henrietta Verma: "We agonized, we discussed, we pondered, and most of all we read, read, read. The results are below: lists of what the LJ Reviews team can honestly say are the best titles published in 2015. They include a Top Ten list of the most outstanding titles of the year, both fiction and nonfiction; followed by 'More of the Best,'—the titles that we just couldn’t let go of although they didn’t make it to the top ten; and the best...

Poet and critic Ron Slate has written an in-depth review of Nickole Brown's 2015 collection Fanny Says. Focusing on Brown's language, form, and personal stake in her writing, Slate calls the collection "cross-genre with a purpose."  "Although the poems illuminate Fanny’s life and behavior, Fanny Says is an acknowledgement and appreciation of an inheritance, the poet’s striving 'to keep alive a fierce and singular part of myself that lives only through her,' as Brown remarked in an interview . . . Fanny Says is animated by the elemental principles of presence--the unique habits of an individual and the flaring of its influence through language."...

In honor of Hispanic Heritage Month, NBC News has included Ray Gonzalez's new book, Beautiful Wall, on its list of "10 New Books by Established Latino Authors." According to reviewer Rigoberto González, Beautiful Wall allows "the reader to experience this expansive American terrain through [its] image-driven verse." "The U.S.-Mexico border," the review continues, "is where histories and stories converge, not always pleasant but not always tragic, and certainly worth considering. Magic awaits the keen observer, the careful listener." Along with other authors on the list, including Sandra Cisneros, Judith Ortiz Cofer, Luis Alberto Urrea, and U.S. Poet Laureate Juan Felipe...

Library Journal is again praising Ray Gonzalez's new poetry collection Beautiful Wall. In June, LJ named Gonzalez a "Key Poet to Discover and Rediscover," saying that "this latest collection, set in the sun-scorched desert region, perches on the wall between Gonzalez’s Mexican heritage and American upbringing and investigates all that entails." In a new LJ review, Doris Lynch calls the poems in Beautiful Wall "rich with cultural identity and blessed with a sense of place." The review mentions the sense of "journey" felt throughout the collection, while also noting how "nature becomes a breathing presence." Lynch adds that "several poems...