PNBA Annual Book Awards

PNBA BOOK AWARDS

2022 PACIFIC NORTHWEST BOOKSELLERS ASSOCIATION AWARD WINNERS

Each year since 1964, the PNBA Book Awards have celebrated exceptional books written by Northwest authors. The books on this page were selected from more than 400 nominated titles published in 2021 by a dedicated volunteer committee of independent booksellers. Congratulations to this year’s winners!

Time is a Flower

by Julie Morstad (Vancouver, BC) A brilliant and beautiful invitation to think about our relationship to time and how we spend it. Pages of bright, saturated color flow with a rhythm that allows space to breathe, inviting the reader to turn the pages over and over again. Tundra Books • Picture Book

Iron Widow

by Xiran Jay Zhao (Vancouver, BC) Giant transforming robots fueled by the life force of their pilots; a system which exploits gender norms and sacrifices girls in the name of empire; a protagonist who will do anything to put an end to it. A fierce retelling of the life of the Chinese Empress Wu

Zetian and an iron strong debut. Penguin Random House • Young Adult Fiction

Unfollow Me:

Essays On Complicity

by Jill Louise Busby (Olympia, WA) Busby's essays show, not just tell, why it may ultimately be better to be unfollowed than embraced. Her transparency as a Southern-raised Black LGBTQ woman now living in the Pacific Northwest provides a perspective most readers won’t realize they needed until they

encounter her illuminating voice. Bloomsbury Publishing • Current Events

Cloud Cuckoo Land

by Anthony Doerr (Boise, ID) A masterpiece spanning multiple characters, time periods, and places. Readers will be drawn into this clever literary puzzle and repeatedly satisfied every time one piece is revealed to relate to another. Cloud Cuckoo Land celebrates the power of stories and how they connect us as well as comfort us during difficult times. Simon & Schuster • Fiction

Funeral for Flaca

by Emilly Prado (Portland, OR) A deeply personal and often hilarious collection about coming of age, family, and identity. Prado pours her heart and soul into these essays and readers are likely to recognize a piece of themselves within these pages. Emerging voices like Prado's keep the literary landscape of

the PNW fresh and exciting! Future Tense Books • Essays Pacific Northwest

What Strange Paradise

by Omar El Akkad (Portland, OR) The difficult topic of immigration is navigated thoughtfully through the story of a young boy's accidental ocean voyage with a group of refugees, where, as a lone survivor of the journey, he becomes one himself. With great heart, El Akkad demonstrates the curiosity and compassion the young bring to bear upon the cruel and absurd world adults have