Aspen Words has announced the semifinalists for the 2025 Literary Prize, which recognizes works of fiction with a social impact with a $35,000 award.
The 14-book longlist is a mix of novels and short story collections, written by well-known Pulitzer Prize finalists alongside debut authors.
Almost half of this year’s selections are set in the past; a couple explore the future, too. The authors grapple with themes like race, class, gender and immigration. Their books were selected not only for their literary merit, but also for their ability to highlight “vital contemporary issues.”
A jury panel will read all of the shortlisted books, and select five finalists in the spring. A winner will be announced in April, taking home a $35,000 prize.
2025 Aspen Words Literary Prize Longlist
Each description is based on the synopsis provided by Aspen Words via book publishers, unless otherwise noted.
- “Madwoman” by Chelsea Bieker: A woman’s life begins to unravel after the secrets and terrors of her past catch up to her peaceful present. Bieker’s third book grapples with motherhood, loss, intimate violence and “the brutal, mighty things women do to keep themselves and each other alive.”
- “Sky Full of Elephants” by Cebo Campbell: A “post-racial” America emerges after all of the nation’s white people walk into the nearest body of water. A Black man finds himself and his estranged daughter living in a new world, reckoning with their senses of identity and community in Campbell’s debut novel.
- “James” by Percival Everett: This reimagining of “Huckleberry Finn” tells a classic story of escape from the perspective of Jim, a Black man fleeing slavery. Everett, a Pulitzer Prize finalist in fiction, brings an “electrifying humor and lacerating observations” to a familiar tale — while highlighting Jim’s “agency, intelligence and compassion.”
- “Anita de Monte Laughs Last” by Xochitl Gonzales:The titular character is a rising artist when she’s found dead in New York City, her name nearly forgotten a decade and a half later. A first-generation Ivy League art student discovers de Monte’s story and finds parallels in her own life in this novel, which NPR calls “a complex dissection of art, gender and marriage” from a Pulitzer Prize finalist for commentary.
- “A Great Country” by Shilpi Somaya Gowda: Immigration, social class, and privilege come to a head in this story of the Shah family in Pacific Hills, California. This fourth book from a bestselling author explores “the myth of the model minority and questions the price of the American dream” after the Shah’s 12-year-old son is arrested.
- “Kingdom of No Tomorrow” by Fabienne Josaphat: A young Haitian student in Oakland falls in with the Black Panthers in 1968 and falls in love with one of the group’s leaders. Documenting its protagonist’s move to Chicago, Josephat’s second novel also confronts police violence, segregation and “revolution in the midst of injustice.”
- “The Road to the Salt Sea” by Samuel Kọ́láwọlé: A low-paid employee at a four-star hotel becomes “caught in a web of violence, guilt and fear” after a room service order brings him face to face with a sex worker and a dangerous guest. This debut novel becomes a survival story, also exploring themes like “family, fate, religion” and “the failures of the Nigerian class system.”
- “Before the Mango Ripens” by Afabwaje Kurian: Three protagonists weigh opportunities, progress and fragile relationships in 1970s Nigeria. This debut novel from an Iowa Writers’ Workshop aluma examines a community in a state of change and weighs the impact of American missionaries amid mounting tensions and the period “between post-colonial dependency and self-rule.”
- “Wandering Stars” by Tommy Orange: A cycle of Indigenous erasure and institutional violence shapes this story about a young survivor of the Sand Creek Massacre and his descendants, forced to adapt to White culture. This new work of historical fiction from a Pulitzer Prize finalist summons the “ancestors” of the “warriors, drunks, outlaws (and) addicts” whom readers encountered in Orange’s debut novel, “There There.”
- "Lilith" by Eric Rickstad: After her son is severely injured in a school shooting, a woman commits a “shocking” criminal act. She seeks to call out the men in power who will not stop a cycle of violence, but later questions the justice of her act; NPR says Rickstad’s latest novel is “one of the most uncomfortable novels you’ll read this year,” a work “full of sadness and rage.”
- “There Is a Rio Grande in Heaven” by Ruben Reyes Jr.: Characters range “from mango farmers to popstars to ex-guerilla fighters to cyborgs” in this debut short story collection from an Iowa Writers’ Workshop alumnus. In “strange dreamlike worlds,” Reyes amplifies the voices of Central Americans who grapple with challenging decisions that may mean the difference between life and death.
- “Fire Exit” by Morgan Talty: A man becomes “increasingly haunted by his past,” as he considers the life he never had on Maine’s Penobscot Reservation across the river. His neighbor, Elizabeth, is his daughter — a secret that he now wants to share in this debut novel from a member of the Penobscot Indian Nation.
- “Devil Is Fine” by John Vercher: A biracial narrator, “still reeling from a sudden tragedy,” plans to sell the land he inherits from an estranged white grandfather — only to discover he is now the Black owner of a former plantation. This third book from an acclaimed novelist is a “story of discovering and reclaiming a painful past,” with elements of “tragedy and humor,” alike.
- “The Safekeep” by Yael van der Wouden: In a rural Dutch province in 1961, a woman's life of “routine and discipline” becomes one of anger, obsession and sensuality after her brother’s girlfriend moves in as a long-term houseguest. This debut novel, also nominated for the Booker Prize, sets one woman’s unraveling and self-discovery against the backdrop of “historical reckoning” — combining “secrets and sex in postwar Europe,” according to The Guardian.
You can read more about each of the longlisted authors and their work on Aspen Words' website.
