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American Book Awards 2015

The 2015 American Book Awards went to A Brief History of Seven Killings by Marlon James, An Indigenous Peoples' History of the United States by Roxanne Dunbar-Ortiz, Forbidden City, USA: Chinese American Nightclubs, 1936-1970 by Arthur Dong, Los Duros by Manuel Luis Martinez, Rebel Music: Race, Empire, and the New Muslim Youth Culture by Hisham Aidi, Southside Buddhist by Ira Sukrungruang, The Black Man of Happiness by Peter J. Harris, The Moor's Account by Laila Lalami, The People's Platform: Taking Back Power and Culture in the Digital Age by Astra Taylor, The Universal Tone: Bringing My Story to Light by Carlos Santana, This Changes Everything: Capitalism vs. The Climate by Naomi Klein, from unincorporated territory [guma'] by Craig Santos Perez and her beckoning hands by Arlene Biala.

Winners

  1. A Brief History of Seven Killings by Marlon Jamessource (opens in a new tab)
  2. An Indigenous Peoples' History of the United States by Roxanne Dunbar-Ortizsource (opens in a new tab)
  3. Forbidden City, USA: Chinese American Nightclubs, 1936-1970 by Arthur Dongsource (opens in a new tab)
  4. Los Duros by Manuel Luis Martinezsource (opens in a new tab)
  5. Rebel Music: Race, Empire, and the New Muslim Youth Culture by Hisham Aidisource (opens in a new tab)
  6. Southside Buddhist by Ira Sukrungruangsource (opens in a new tab)
  7. The Black Man of Happiness by Peter J. Harrissource (opens in a new tab)
  8. The Moor's Account by Laila Lalamisource (opens in a new tab)
  9. The People's Platform: Taking Back Power and Culture in the Digital Age by Astra Taylorsource (opens in a new tab)
  10. The Universal Tone: Bringing My Story to Light by Carlos Santanasource (opens in a new tab)
  11. This Changes Everything: Capitalism vs. The Climate by Naomi Kleinsource (opens in a new tab)
  12. from unincorporated territory [guma'] by Craig Santos Perezsource (opens in a new tab)
  13. her beckoning hands by Arlene Bialasource (opens in a new tab)

About the American Book Awards

Every book the Before Columbus Foundation honored, 2006-2025. The award has no categories, nominees or shortlist, so every row is category Book, level Winner. Year is the announcement year. Sources are the Foundation's own press releases and programs (PDFs and images on beforecolumbusfoundation.com) for 2006, 2008-2014, 2016-2021 and 2024-2025. Fallback to Wikipedia's American Book Awards list for 2007 (the Foundation's poster names only the winners, matching Wikipedia's list), 2015, 2022 and 2023 (no Foundation release online; web.archive.org was unreachable). Lifetime achievement, editor/publisher, oral literature and anti-censorship honors for people, journals or presses are skipped. Walter & Lillian Lowenfels Criticism Awards and the 2021 Anti-Censorship Award are included when the release names a book (2018, 2020, 2021, 2022, 2024, 2025). Edited works list the work's author where the release names one (Jack Spicer, Bob Kaufman, Jean Racine, Lorenzo Thomas, Jose Antonio Burciaga); otherwise the editors. The 2019 Vollmann honor covers both volumes of Carbon Ideologies and is one row. Titles lightly normalized from the releases (typos such as Each Moth I Sing, Victor Lavalle and The Big Machine fixed).

Organization: Before Columbus Foundation. Years are award years, which can differ from publication years. Official site (opens in a new tab)

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