Salvatore Scibona's THE END wins the Young Lions Fiction Award

March 17, 2009--Graywolf Press is happy to announce that Salvatore Scibona has won the New York Public Library's Young Lions Fiction Award for his debut novel, The End. The award, now in its ninth year, was presented at a ceremony last evening by Library President Paul LeClerc. The ceremony was held in the Celeste Bartos Forum of the landmark Humanities and Social Sciences Library.

Ethan Hawke, one of the founders of the award, was joined onstage by actors Billy Crudup, and Zoe Kazan to read excerpts from each of the finalists’ works. The four other finalists for the award were Jon Fasman (The Unpossessed City), Rivka Galchen (Atmospheric Disturbances), Sana Krasikov (One More Year), and Zachary Mason (The Lost Books of the Odyssey).

“In the nine years since its founding the Young Lions Fiction Award has called attention to nominated works by forty-six talented authors,” said Library President Paul LeClerc. “It is indeed a privilege to celebrate and support young writers who are forming the future landscape of American cultural expression.”

Scibona’s The End is a story is about a single day in 1953 as lived by six people at an Ohio carnival. The tale follows several characters—an elderly abortionist, an enigmatic drapery seamstress, a teenage boy, a jeweler—across the seven preceding decades and looks into the heart of a crime that interweave all of their lives. The End is an astonishing, evocative portrait of immigrant lives in one singular American city.

“I would like to very much thank The New York Public Library for this honor and for being such a haven when I lived in New York City,” said Scibona in accepting the award.

Salvatore Scibona’s fiction has been published in the Threepenny Review, Best New American Voices 2004, and The Pushcart Book of Short Stories: The Best Stories a Quarter Century of the Pushcart Prize. He is a graduate of the Iowa Writers’ Workshop, and is the writing coordinator at the Fine Arts Work Center in Provincetown, Massachusetts. The End, a 2008 National Book Award finalist, is his first book.

The Young Lions Fiction Award was established in 2001 by the Young Lions, a membership group for supporters of the Library in their 20s and 30s. It is the only major book prize that recognizes fiction by younger writers and includes a $10,000 prize for the award recipient and $1,000 for the other finalists. The five finalists were selected by a reading committee of Young Lions members, writers, editors, and librarians. A panel of three award judges, including last year’s winner Ron Currie, Jr.; André Aciman; and Lore Segal, currently in residence as a fellow at the Library's Cullman Center for Scholars and Writers, subsequently choose the winner for the $10,000 prize.

About The Young Lions Fiction Award
The New York Public Library Young Lions Fiction Award is a $10,000 prize awarded each spring to a writer age 35 or younger for a novel or a collection of short stories. Established in 2001, this annual award recognizes the work of young authors and celebrates their accomplishments publicly, making a difference in their lives as they continue to build their careers. The Young Lions Fiction Award was spearheaded by Young Lions Committee members Ethan Hawke, Jennifer Rudolph Walsh, Rick Moody, and Hannah McFarland. The Award is made possible by an endowment created with generous gifts from Russell Abrams, Nina Collins, Hannah and Gavin McFarland, Ethan Hawke, Stephan Loewentheil, Rick Moody, Andrea Olshan and Jennifer Rudolph Walsh.

About The New York Public Library
The New York Public Library was created in 1895 with the consolidation of the private libraries of John Jacob Astor and James Lenox with the Samuel Jones Tilden Trust. The Library provides free and open access to its physical and electronic collections and information, as well as to its services. It comprises four research centers – The Humanities and Social Sciences Library; The New York Public Library for the Performing Arts; the Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture; and the Science, Industry and Business Library–and 87 Branch Libraries in Bronx, Manhattan, and Staten Island. Research and circulating collections combined total more than 50 million items, including materials for the visually impaired. In addition, each year the Library presents thousands of exhibitions and public programs, which include classes in technology, literacy, and English as a second language. The New York Public Library serves over 16 million patrons who come through its doors annually and another 25 million users internationally, who access collections and services through the NYPL website, www.nypl.org