Annal:1992 Los Angeles Times Book Prize for First Fiction
From AwardAnnals
Results of the Los Angeles Times Book Prize in the year 1992. For a ranked list of books, try an honor roll:
- 1992 LATimes–1st Fiction winner
- Score: 10.42
High Cotton is an extraordinarily rich account of the dreams and inner turmoils of a new generation of the black upper middle class, capturing the essence of a part of American society that has mostly been ignored in literature. The novel’s protagonist journeys from his childhood home in the midwest to college, a stint in New York publishing, and Europe, yet the issue of his “blackness” remains at the heart of his being.
1959: A Novel
- 1992 LATimes–1st Fiction finalist
- Score: 6.42
Thulani Davis’s 1959 is a powerful, poignant coming-of-age novel that captures a dramatic moment in American history as clearly as a photograph. It’s the summer of 1959 and Willie Tarrant of Turner, Virginia, is twelve. Her father and other adults in the town are worried about integration—how it will affect their children’s safety and the quality of their education—but for Willie it’s just another problem she’s going to have to deal with, like her chores and beginning to go out with boys. Willie and her friends—kids from good families with good grades—are…
- 1992 LATimes–1st Fiction finalist
- Score: 6.42
In this extraordinary coming-of-age odyssey, Wally Lamb invites us to hitch a wild ride on a journey of love, pain, and renewal with the most heartbreakingly comical heroine to come along in years.
Meet Dolores Price. She’s 13, wise-mouthed but wounded, having bid her childhood goodbye. Stranded in front of her bedroom TV, she spends the next few years nourishing herself with the Mallomars, potato chips, and Pepsi her anxious mother supplies. When she finally orbits into young womanhood at 257 pounds, Dolores is no stronger and life is no kinder. But this…
- 1992 LATimes–1st Fiction finalist
- Score: 6.42
In this touching and humorous story, Joanne and William make their way through the hazards of modern marriage—enduring precocious, rebellious children; the joy of emotional intimacy and the despair of its loss; aging parents; eccentric friends; comic marriage counselors; and flawed lovers.
