MFA student Kinsale Drake receives American Book Award for poetry anthology
On July 29, The Before Columbus Foundation announced the winners of the Forty-Seventh Annual American Book Awards.
Third-Year MFA student Kinsale Drake co-edited a winning anthology with Stacie Shannon Denetsosie and Darcie Little Badger, Beyond the Glittering World: An Anthology of Indigenous Feminisms and Futurisms (Torrey House Press). Read the full press release. [pdf]
Kinsale Drake is a Diné writer and citizen of the Navajo Nation. Her debut poetry collection The Sky Was Once a Dark Blanket (University of Georgia Press, 2024) was the winner of the 2023 National Poetry Series. Her work often celebrates elders, cacti, and rock ‘n’ roll. She is the founder of NDN Girls Book Club. Stacie Shannon Denetsosie is a citizen of the Navajo Nation and the author of the award-winning The Missing Morningstar and Other Stories. Darcie Little Badger is a Lipan Apache writer whose critically acclaimed novels include Elatsoe (Locus Award for Best First Novel), A Snake Falls to Earth (Nebula Award, Ignyte Award, Newbery Honor), and Sheine Lende (USA Today bestseller).
The 2026 American Book Award winners will be formally recognized on September 26 at the University of California – Berkeley.
The American Book Awards were created to provide recognition for outstanding literary achievement from the entire spectrum of America’s diverse literary community. The purpose of the awards is to recognize literary excellence without limitations or restrictions. The Before Columbus Foundation views American culture as inclusive and has always considered the term “multicultural” to be not a description of various categories, groups, or “special interests,” but rather as the definition of all of American literature. The Awards are not bestowed by an industry organization, but rather are a writers’ award given by other writers.