Award recipients at the 26th Annual Lambda Literary Awards were announced last night at the gala ceremony at The Great Hall at Cooper Union in New York. The ceremony was hosted by comedienne Kate Clinton for the third year in a row, and brought together over 500 attendees, sponsors and celebrities to celebrate excellence in LGBT literature.
The ceremony opened with a montage of video clips from Lambda Literary's "What LGBTQI Book Changed Your Life" campaign in which readers uploaded videos under the hashtag #abooksavedmylife discussing books that deeply affected them. You can see a clip of the opening ceremony montage below:
Cartoonist Justin Hall presented the Board of Trustees Award for Excellence in Literature to Alison Bechdel for her body of work including the comic strip Dykes to Watch Out For and her memoir Fun Home. Bechdel then presented the new award for Best Graphic Novel to Nicole J. Georges for Calling Dr. Laura: A Graphic Memoir.
Kate Bornstein was presented the Pioneer Award by her life partner, Barbara Carrellas. Bornstein's call to action to stop the history of shaming with regard to sex and gender brought a standing ovation.
Michael Thomas Ford and Radclyffe were awarded the Dr. James Duggins Outstanding Mid-Career Novelist prize and Imogen Binnie and Charles Rice-Gonzalez won the Dr. Berzon Emerging Writer Award.
Justin Vivian Bond provided entertainment with three songs from v's recent show, "The Drift." Some of the presenters who took the stage were: Mike Albo, Henry Alford, Hilton Als, Masha Gessen, A.M. Homes, Sassafras Lowrey, David Mixner, Pauline Park, Seth Rudetsky, Ira Silverberg, and Urvashi Vaid.
"Throughout the beautiful ceremony, we were reminded of the meaningfulness of LGBT literature and writers in our lives," said Tony Valenzuela, Lambda Literary Foundation Executive Director. "Congratulations to all the winners and honorees."
See below for a full list of award recipients:
26th ANNUAL LAMBDA LITERARY AWARD WINNERS
GAY GENERAL FICTION
- Mundo Cruel: Stories, Luis Negron; translated by Suzanne Jill Levine, Seven Stories Press
LESBIAN GENERAL FICTION
- Happiness, Like Water, Chinelo Okparanta, Mariner Books (Houghton Mifflin Harcourt)
LGBT DEBUT
- Descendants of Hagar, Nik Nicholson, AuthorHouse
BISEXUAL FICTION
- My Education, Susan Choi, Penguin Group/Viking
TRANSGENDER FICTION
- Wanting in Arabic, Trish Salah, TSAR Publications
LGBT NONFICTION
- White Girls, Hilton Als, McSweeney's Publishing
TRANSGENDER NONFICTION
- The End of San Francisco, Mattilda Bernstein Sycamore, City Lights Publishers
BISEXUAL NONFICTION
- The B Word: Bisexuality in Contemporary Film and Television, Maria San Filippo, Indiana University Press
GAY POETRY
- Unpeopled Eden, Rigoberto Gonzalez, Four Way Books
LESBIAN POETRY
- Rise in the Fall, Ana Bozicevic, Birds, LLC
LGBT GRAPHIC NOVEL
- Calling Dr. Laura: A Graphic Memoir, Nicole J. Georges, Houghton Mifflin Harcourt
LGBT CHILDREN'S/YA - TIE
- If You Could Be Mine, Sara Farizan, Algonquin Books
- Two Boys Kissing, David Levithan, Alfred A. Knopf Books for Young Readers
GAY MEMOIR/BIOGRAPHY
- A Heaven of Words: Last Journals, by Glenway Wescott, Ed. Jerry Rosco, University of Wisconsin Press
LESBIAN MEMOIR/BIOGRAPHY
- Body Geographic, Barrie Jean Borich, University of Nebraska Press
GAY MYSTERY
- The Prisoner of the Riviera: A Francis Bacon Mystery, Janice Law, MysteriousPress.com/Open Road Media
LESBIAN MYSTERY
- High Desert, Katherine V. Forrest, Spinsters Ink
GAY ROMANCE
- Into This River I Drown, TJ Klune, Dreamspinner Press
LESBIAN ROMANCE
- Clean Slate, Andrea Bramhall, Bold Strokes Books
GAY EROTICA
- The Padisah's Son and the Fox: an erotic novella, Alex Jeffers, Lethe Press
LESBIAN EROTICA
- Wild Girls, Wild Nights: True Lesbian Sex Stories, Ed. Sacchi Green, Cleis Press
LGBT ANTHOLOGY
- FICTION Queer Africa: New and Collected Fiction, Karen Martin and Makhosazana Xaba, MaThoko's Books
- NON-FICTION Who's Yer Daddy?: Gay Writers Celebrate Their Mentors and Forerunners, Eds. Jim Elledge and David Groff, The University of Wisconsin Press
LGBT DRAMA
- Tom at the Farm, Michel Marc Bouchard, Talonbooks
LGBT SF/F/HORROR
- Death by Silver, Melissa Scott & Amy Griswold, Lethe Press
LGBT STUDIES
- Safe Space: Gay Neighborhood History and the Politics of Violence, Christina B. Hanhardt, Duke University Press