The national organization offers several prestigious awards and hosts an annual writing contest.
WNBA Award
The WNBA Award is presented by the members of the Women’s National Book Association to “a living American woman who derives part or all of her income from books and allied arts, and who has done meritorious work in the world of books beyond the duties or responsibilities of her profession or occupation.” The award was formerly known as the Constance Lindsay Skinner Award.
For our Centennial year, the WNBA Award was awarded to the current librarian of Congress, Dr. Carla Hayden and to novelist, poet, and bookstore owner Louise Erdrich.
Carla Hayden was sworn in as the 14th Librarian of Congress on September 14, 2016. Hayden, the first degreed librarian, the woman, and the first African American to lead the national library. Hayden was president of the American Library Association from 2003 to 2004. In 1995, she was the first African American to receive Library Journal’s Librarian of the Year Award in recognition of her outreach services at the Pratt Library, which included an after-school center for Baltimore teens offering homework assistance and college and career counseling. Hayden was president of the American Library Association and, prior to her position as Librarian of Congress, was CEO of the Enoch Pratt Free Library in Baltimore, Maryland. She held the position of deputy commissioner and chief librarian at the Chicago Public Library and also was a professor of library and information science at the University of Pittsburgh.
Louise Erdrich was born in Little Falls, Minnesota in 1954. As the daughter of a Chippewa Indian mother and a German-American father, Erdrich explores Native-American themes in her works, with major characters representing both sides of her heritage. Ms. Erdrich is the author of fifteen novels as well as volumes of poetry, children’s books, short stories, and a memoir of early motherhood. Her novel The Round House won the National Book
Award for Fiction. The Plague of Doves won the Anisfield-Wolf Book Award and was a finalist for the Pulitzer Prize, and her debut novel, Love Medicine, was the winner of the National Book Critics Circle Award. Erdrich has received the Library of Congress Prize in American Fiction, the prestigious PEN/Saul Bellow Award for Achievement in American Fiction, and the Dayton Literary Peace Prize. She lives in Minnesota with her daughters and is the owner of Birchbark Books, a small independent bookstore.
Past winners have included Edith Hamilton, author of Mythology (1958); Pearl Buck, Winner of the Pulitzer Prize in 1931 for The Good Earth (1960); Eleanor Roosevelt(1961); Rachel Carson, author of Silent Spring (1963); Barbara Tuchman, author of The Guns of August and a Pulitzer Prize Winner; Barbara Bush (1990); Doris Kearns Goodwin, author of Team of Rivals (1998); Patricia Schroeder, Former Congresswoman and President and CEO of the Association of American Publishers (2000); Nancy Pearl, author, librarian, book reviewer, and radio talk show personality (2004); Ann Patchett, author of Bel Canto and owner of Parnassus Books., and Amy King, poet and professor and executive board member of VIDA: Women in Literary Arts. Find out more about the WNBA Award.
Pannell Award
This award was established by the organization in 1981 in honor of a longtime member, Lucile Micheels Pannell. Pannell was a well-known librarian, author, and manager of the Hobby Horse Bookshop at Carson, Pirie, Scott, and Company department store in Chicago. Pannell founded the Chicago Children’s Reading Table and was the first bookseller to win the WNBA Award in 1949. The Pannell Award recognizes the work of booksellers, both general booksellers and those specializing in children’s books, who creatively promote and encourage public interest in books. Find out more about the Pannell Award.
Eastman Grant
The Eastman Grant is a cash award given annually by the Women’s National Book Association to a state library association based in a state in which the organization has a chapter. The Eastman Grant funds librarian professional development and training. The grant honors Ann Heidbreder Eastman, a longtime member of the organization and national president, as well as a member of the American Librarian Association, where she held many leadership roles. Find out more about the Eastman Grant.
WNBA Writing Contest
After years of celebrating published authors, extraordinary book women and others in the field, WNBA decided it is time to celebrate emerging writers. In 2012, the first annual writing contest was announced, for fiction and poetry. The categories have expanded to include nonfiction/memoir and YA. Every five years an anthology of the winning entries is published. Each year the top winner in each category receives a monetary prize and publication of their work in our official publication The Bookwoman. Find out more about the Writing Contest.
Second Century Prize
This newly created prize for our Centennial year is designed to support for literacy and reading, as this is a major part of the WNBA mission. The Second Century Prize is a grant to a non-profit organization that promotes literary and fosters life-long reading. The one-time cash award of $5,000 was awarded Little Free Library, a nonprofit organization that promotes reading for all ages, but especially children, by building free book exchanges.
