Thursday, February 26, 2009

Post-9/11 Novel ‘Netherland’ Wins Pen/Faulkner Award







Joseph O’Neill’s novel “Netherland” was named the winner of the 2009 PEN/Faulkner Award for Fiction, the PEN/Faulkner Foundation said on Wednesday. The honor for “Netherland,” about a Dutch-born equities analyst, his British wife and their son, who live in New York during the Sept. 11 attack and its aftermath, is something of a comeback for Mr. O’Neill, right. The novel, though widely praised, was shut out in the National Book Awards and the National Book Critics Circle awards. The Pen/Faulkner Award, which comes with a prize of $15,000, will be given to Mr. O’Neill at a ceremony on May 9. Four finalists, who will receive $5,000 each, were also named. They are Sarah Shun-lien Bynum for “Ms. Hempel Chronicles,” Susan Choi for “A Person of Interest,” Richard Price for “Lush Life” and Ron Rash for “Serena.”

- Dave Itzkoff, New York Times

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