We are proud to announce that judge Michael Martone has selected Andrea Lewis’s short story collection WHAT MY LAST MAN DID as the winner of the IR/IU Press 2016 Blue Light Books Prize! We received many excellent short story collections and the competition was fierce. Thank you to everyone who submitted their work for consideration and made this year’s Blue Light Books Prize possible. WHAT MY LAST MAN DID will be published by IU Press in Spring 2017.

2016 Blue Light Books Prize Winner:

WHAT MY LAST MAN DID
by Andrea Lewis

Michael Martone says about the winning short story collection: “What the startling and spectrum-smashing stories of WHAT MY LAST MAN DID does is concoct divine disruptions in the fabric of space and time like those recent ripples of gravity captured in a well of laser light. These linked stories (each steeped with authentic voices, settings, and scenes) act like the sticky bonds of four-handed carbon to form amplified matrixes of very certain emotions, moods, and nuances. Under the catalytic influence and stately pressure of Lewis’s compressed and impressive style and grace, WHAT MY LAST MAN DID renders from its sparkling components this genuine gem of a book.”

Finalists:

THE MAGNIFICENTS by Tom Howard

IN THESE CITIES OF ULTRAVIOLET LIGHT by Raul Palma