The Minnesota Book Awards honored writers both established and emerging Thursday night in their second consecutive virtual awards ceremony.
Debut authors Jonathan C. Slaght and Kawai Strong Washburn — both recently honored by PEN America for their books — each won in their categories.
Here's the full list of winners:
Novel & short story: "Sharks in the Time of Saviors," by Washburn (Farrar, Straus and Giroux). Seven-year-old Noa falls overboard and is carefully, tenderly returned to the boat by sharks. Washburn's story is about a working-class Hawaiian family touched by the gods.
General nonfiction: "Owls of the Eastern Ice: A Quest to Find and Save the World's Largest Owl," by Slaght (Farrar, Straus and Giroux). The author spent five winters in far eastern Russia, tracking, banding and studying the rare Blakiston's fish owl in order to understand its habitat and protect it from extinction.
Genre fiction: "The Deep, Deep Snow," by Brian Freeman (Blackstone Publishing). Deputy Shelby Lake must rescue a missing child, but the trail is growing cold in this bestselling thriller by a past Minnesota Book Award winner.