2017 NONFICTION WINNERS

Whitney Egstad’s “The Evolution of a Trigger” from The Rumpus

"My only image of the attack is a single hand. It was, I think, a left hand that tugged at the handkerchief around his face and flipped a switch that will never go back, can never be turned back on."

Silas Hansen’s “On Visibility” from Waccamaw

"If you had asked me, when I first came out as transgender, if I wanted to be seen, I would have said yes. I wanted people to really see me—the way I saw myself: as male. But, in truth, what I really wanted was to be so ordinary that I completely blended into a crowd of men. I wanted a beard, a deep voice, a flat chest, a driver's license and birth certificate and passport that declared me male. I wanted to be invisible."

Jennifer Maritza McCauley’s “But There is Also Rosa” from Passages North

"I didn't like McCauley for different reasons. I simply wanted a last name that fit my Blatina-black skin, something like: Marisol King or Kenya Gonzales or Magarita Freedman, a name that showed my ancestors had some kind of agency; a name that offered no dark surprise when I came into a room. I didn't know how to be proud of my last name, but I wanted to be."

Debbie Weingarten’s “The Hunted” from Guernica

"The desert sun swelters us—bleaches work shirts, burns cheeks, splits tomatoes down the middle. There is always one more row to weed, one more bed to harvest before the heat, the spring winds, the javelina, the first hard freeze."

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