Miami, Jan. 27, 2025 – Miami Dade College’s (MDC) Miami Book Fair (MBF) will host the National Book Foundation’s 5 Under 35 Honorees, featuring readings and conversations with five exceptional fiction authors at 8 p.m. on Thursday, Feb. 20, at Books & Books in Coral Gables. The event is free and open to the public.
Every year, five National Book Award winners and finalists, and previous 5 Under 35 honorees, select one promising fiction writer each to recognize. Each honoree is under the age of 35 and has published only one novel or short story collection in the last five years.
This year’s 5 Under 35 honorees are Antonia Angress (Sirens & Muses), Maya Binyam (Hangman), Zain Khalid (Brother Alive), Tyriek White (We Are a Haunting), and Jenny Tinghui Zhang (Four Treasures of the Sky). The honorees will be present for readings and conversation with moderator Natalie Green, director of programs & partnerships at the National Book Foundation.
Prior to the reading, one of the Honorees will facilitate February’s First Draft, a monthly series of free and informal writing events where community, craft, and rapid-fire creativity meet. Angress will provide a series of freewriting prompts in a low-stakes literary social. The event will run from 6:30 – 7:30 p.m. and is free and open to the public.
About the 5 Under 35 Honorees:
Antonia Angress is the author of Sirens & Muses, a finalist for the Minnesota Book Award and one of Glamour’s Best Books of 2022. She is a National Endowment for the Arts Literature Fellow, a Minnesota State Arts Board Grantee, and a graduate of Brown and the University of Minnesota’s MFA program. Born in Los Angeles and raised in Costa Rica, she lives in Minneapolis with her family.
Maya Binyam is the author of Hangman, which received the Rosenthal Family Foundation Award from the American Academy of Arts and Letters, and was longlisted for the Women’s Prize. Her work has appeared in The Paris Review, The New Yorker, Best American Short Stories, and elsewhere. She lives in Los Angeles.
Zain Khalid’s debut novel, Brother Alive, won the New York Public Library Young Lions Fiction Award and the CLMP Firecracker Award for Fiction, was a finalist for the National Book Critics Circle John Leonard Prize for best first book in any genre, and was shortlisted for the Ursula K. Le Guin Prize for Fiction. Khalid is the recipient of the 2024 Bard Fiction Prize. His writing has appeared in The Paris Review, The New Yorker, and Bookforum, among others.
Tyriek Rashawn White is the author of We Are a Haunting, (Astra House, 2023) which won the Center for Fiction First Novel Prize and was longlisted for the Brooklyn Public Library Book Prize. He has received fellowships from Callaloo Writing Workshop, New York State Writer’s Institute, and Key West Literary Seminar, among others.
Jenny Tinghui Zhang’s fiction and nonfiction have appeared in Apogee, Ninth Letter, Passages North, The Rumpus, HuffPost, The Cut, Catapult, and more. She holds an MFA from the University of Wyoming and has received support from Kundiman, Tin House, and VONA/Voices. She was born in Changchun, China and grew up in Austin, Texas, where she currently lives. Four Treasures of the Sky is her debut.
Natalie Green is director of programs & partnerships at the National Book Foundation. Before joining the Foundation, Natalie was the Manager of Los Angeles Programs at PEN America. She holds a BA in English and Creative Writing from UCLA, and is a Brooklyn Book Festival Bookends committee member.
To RSVP, click here.
WHAT: MBF to Host National Book Foundation’s 5 Under 35 Young Fiction Writers
WHEN: Thursday, Feb. 20, at 6:30 p.m. (First Draft Writing Social) and 8 p.m. (Reading and Discussion)
WHERE: Books & Books, 265 Aragon Ave.
Coral Gables, FL 33134
About Miami Book Fair
Founded in 1984 by Miami Dade College and partners, Miami Book Fair engages the community through inclusive, accessible programs that promote reading and support writers year-round. The annual eight-day festival has grown into the largest and most comprehensive community-rooted literary gathering in the United States generating discourse on contemporary literature and current issues of international importance. Throughout the rest of the year, Miami Book Fair responds hosts an ongoing schedule of activities, including The Little Haiti Book Festival; creative writing and publishing workshops; author presentations; reading campaigns; and Read to Learn Books for Free, a partnership with The Children’s Trust that distributes more than 150,000 free books a year to children in Miami-Dade County. Miami Book Fair programming is made possible through generous support from the State of Florida and the National Endowment for the Arts; City of Miami; Miami-Dade County Department of Cultural Affairs and the Cultural Affairs Council; Miami-Dade County Mayor and Board of County Commissioners; Miami-Dade County Public Schools; Greater Miami Convention and Visitors Bureau; Miami Downtown Development Authority; and Friends of the Fair; as well as many corporate partners. Miami Book Fair: Building community, one reader at a time.
Miami Book Fair contact: Lisa Palley, Palley Promotes, 305-642-3132, lpalley@bellsouth.net.