
The co-winners of the Shenandoah Fiction Prize are Heather Goodman, author of “Humdinger” and Joseph Bathanti, author of “Rita’s Dream.”
Goodman was motivated to pursue fiction after attending the Bread Loaf Writers’ Conference and working in fiction at the Loft Literary Center.
She has been published in “Grey’s Sporting Journal,” “Printers Row,” “Hunger Mountain,” “Crab Orchard Review” and The Chicago Tribune, where her story “His Dog” won the Nelson Algren Award.
Bathanti is the author of six books of poetry, including “The Feast of All Saints” and “Restoring Sacred Art” (winner of the 2010 Roanoke Chowan Prize). His novel, “East Liberty,” won the 2001 Carolina Novel Award and his latest novel, “Coventry,” won the 2006 Novello Literary Award. His book of stories, “The High Heart,” won the 2006 Spokane Prize.
He is the recipient of literature fellowships from the North Carolina Arts Council in 1994 (poetry) and 2009 (fiction); the Samuel Talmadge Ragan Award, presented annually for outstanding contributions to the Fine Arts of North Carolina over an extended period; the Linda Flowers Prize; and many others.
The James Boatwright III Prize for Poetry winner is “The Odds” by Steven Kronen.
Kronen’s “Splendor” appeared from BOA Press in 2006. His poetry has appeared in “The New Republic,” “The American Scholar,” “Poetry” and “The Georgia Review,” among others.
He has been a fellow at Bread Loaf and the Sewanee Writers’ Conference, received a literary grant from the National Endowment for the Arts, two Florida Arts Council grants and the Cecil Hemley Memorial Award from the Poetry Society of America. His first book, “Empirical Evidence,” published by the University of Georgia Press in 1992, won the Contemporary Poetry Series prize.
The winner of the Carter Prize for the Essay is “How to Skin a Bird” by Chelsea Biondolillo. Her prose has appeared recently or is forthcoming in “Hayden’s Ferry Review,” “Wilder Quarterly,” “Brevity,” “Flyway,” “The Fiddleback” and NPR, among others. She is currently an M.F.A. candidate at the University of Wyoming in both nonfiction and environmental studies.