From Boreal Community Media - May 9, 2019

The category winners will be announced at the celebration on May 23 at the Northland Country Club.  

This year's celebration guest speaker, Margi Preus, is the author of the Newbery Honor book Heart of a Samurai and other books for young readers, including the Minnesota Book Award-winning West of the Moon, and the Midwest Booksellers Choice Award book The Clue in the Trees, part of the Enchantment Lake mystery series. Her books have won multiple awards, landed on the New York Times bestseller list, been honored as ALA/ALSC Notables, selected as an NPR Backseat Book Club pick, chosen for community reads, and translated into many languages. When not writing, Margi enjoys traveling, speaking, and visiting schools all over the world. At home in Duluth she likes to ski, hike, paddle, or sit quietly with a book in her lap.

NEMBA was established in 1988 to recognize books that substantially represent Northeastern Minnesota in the areas of history, culture, heritage, or lifestyle. The 31st annual NEMBAs will honor books published in 2018.

The winning author in each category will receive a cash prize of $200. The winning author and the honorable mention in each category will receive a glass plaque as well as 100 NEMBA book seals.  The celebration is presented by UMD's Kathryn A. Martin Library & Friends of the Duluth Public Library.

The list of this year's nominees Northeastern Minnesota Book Awards follows:

In the category of FICTION

Thomas Peacock, Beginnings: The Homeward Journey of Donovan Manypenny 

Sarah Stonich, Laurentian Divide: A Novel

Naomi Musch, Mist O'er the Voyageur

Janet Kay, The Sisters

Nikki Rajala, Treacherous Waters: The Chronicles of an Unlikely Voyageur

Pat McGauley, Waiting

In the category of POETRY

Peggy Trojan, All that Matters: Collected Poems 2010-2018

Brian Laidlaw, The Mirrormaker: Poems

Bart Sutter, Nordic Accordion: Poems in a Scandinavian Mood

Crystal S. Gibbins (editor) and Michelle Menting (editor), Waters Deep: a Great Lakes Poetry Anthology

Diane Jarvenpa, The Way She Told Her Story

Lynette Reini-Grandell, Wild Verge: Poems

Ryan Vine, To Keep Him Hidden

In the category of NONFICTION

Katya Gordon, Climate Change: Musings and Studies from Lake Superior's North Shore

Timothy Cochrane, Gichi Bitobig, Grand Marais: Early Accounts of the Anishinaabeg and the North Shore Fur Trade

Cary J. Griffith, Gunflint Burning: Fire in the Boundary Waters

Connie Jacobson, Hellfire in Hermantown: The 1918 Forest Fires and How They Affected Hermantown

Tony Dierckins and Pete Clure, Naturally Brewed, Naturally Better: The Historic Breweries of Duluth & Superior

Phyllis Root (author), Kelly Povo (photographs), Searching for Minnesota's Native Wildflowers: A Guide for Beginners, Botanists, and Everyone in Between

C. Philip Johnson, Rodney Ikola, and Davis Helberg, Thomson Township's Night of Terror: The Great 1918 Fire

C. Roger Pellett, Whaleback Ships and the American Steel Barge Company

In the category of MEMOIR

Michael Fedo, Don't Quit Your Day Job: The Adventures of a Midlist Author

Grant J. Merritt, Iron and Water: My Life Protecting Minnesota's Environment

Jennifer Case, Sawbill: A Search for Place

In the category of CHILDREN’S LITERATURE

Lori Fisher Peelen (author) and Consie Powell (illustrator), Big Fish Dreams

Susan Larson Kidd (author) and Richard Hoeg (illustrator), Hey There Mr. Owl!

Mary Casanova (author) and Nick Wroblewski (illustrator), Hush Hush, Forest

K.M. Allen (author/illustrator), Where I Fly: A Hockey Story

Carla Anne Arneson (author/illustrator),  A Young Girl's Dream

Katharine Johnson (author) and Alicia Schwab (illustrator), The Mukluk Ball

In the category of ART/PHOTOGRAPHY

Wing Young Huie, Chinese-ness

Walter F. Mondale and Craig Blacklock, Photographs by Craig Blacklock, St. Croix & Namekagon Rivers: The Enduring Gift

For more information on this year's event, follow this link.  https://lib.d.umn.edu/about/nemba