THE VOICE OF CHICAGO'S GAY, LESBIAN, BI, TRANS AND QUEER COMMUNITY SINCE 1985

Dedicated to the memory of author and journalist Jim Duggins, this prize honors LGBTQ-identified authors who have published multiple novels, built a strong reputation and following, and show promise to continue publishing high quality work for years to come.

This award is made possible by the James Duggins, PhD Fund for Outstanding Mid-Career LGBTQ Novelists, a fund of the Horizons Foundation, and includes a cash prize of $5,000.

Ryka Aoki's latest novel, Light From Uncommon Stars (Tor Books 2021) was an Alex, Otherwise, and SCKA Award winner, and was a finalist for the Hugo, Locus, Dragon, and Ignyte Awards. Ryka's first novel, He Mele a Hilo, was called one of the "10 Best Books Set in Hawaii" by Bookriot. Her work has appeared or been recognized in publications including Vogue, Elle, Bustle, Autostraddle, PopSugar, Honolulu Magazine, and Buzzfeed, as well as NBC News and the Smithsonian Asian Pacific American Center. She was also honored by the American Association of Hiroshima Nagasaki A-Bomb Survivors, where two of her compositions were named the organization's "songs of peace." Ryka has been recognized by the California State Senate for "extraordinary commitment to the visibility and well-being of Transgender people." She is a two-time Lambda Literary Award finalist, and served as the Poetry Faculty for the 2018 Lambda Emerging Writers Retreat. She has an MFA in creative writing from Cornell University, where she was awarded the Philip Freund Prize for Excellence in Publication, as well as the University Award from the Academy of American Poets. Ryka is currently a professor of English at Santa Monica College.

Aaron Hamburger is the author of a story collection titled The View from Stalin's Head which was awarded the Rome Prize by the American Academy of Arts and Letters and nominated for a Violet Quill Award. He has also written three novels: Faith for Beginners, nominated for a Lambda Literary Award, Nirvana is Here, winner of a Bronze Medal from the 2019 Foreword Reviews Indies Book Awards, and his most recent novel Hotel Cuba, published this May. His writing has appeared in The New York Times, The Washington Post, The Chicago Tribune, The Village Voice, Tin House, Michigan Quarterly Review, Subtropics, Crazyhorse, Boulevard, Poets & Writers, Tablet, O, the Oprah Magazine, Out, The Massachusetts Review, The Bennington Review, Nerve, Time Out, Details, and The Forward. He has also won fellowships from Yaddo, Djerassi, the Civitella Ranieri Foundation, the DC Commission on the Arts and Humanities, and the Edward F. Albee Foundation. He has taught creative writing at Columbia University, the George Washington University, New York University, Brooklyn College, and the Stonecoast MFA Program.