Happy University Press Week! Help us celebrate university presses November 9-13. Since 2012, members of the Association of University Presses have participated in an annual celebration of University Presses.
This year’s theme for UP Week is “Power UP.” This theme showcases how university presses Power UP to give voice to scholarship and bolster the unfettered exchange of ideas around the world.
The #UPweek blog tour today asks presses to tell us about any highlights from the year. Posts on today’s topic, highlighting accomplishments that have changed the way university presses interact with the world, come from Temple University Press, Hopkins Press, Leuven University Press, University of Chicago Press, TCU Press, University of Michigan Press, University of Notre Dame Press, Edinburgh University Press, Athabasca University Press, SUNY Press, University of Iowa Press, and University of Illinois Press.
Recent Highlights from UNP
For our contribution, we’re going to highlight some recent books and achievements. As a press, we are thrilled to have 32 authors recognized as an award winner and 37 authors recognized as an award finalist in this past fiscal year. Some notable award placements from FY25-26 include the following:
Gbenga Adesina’s Death Does Not End at the Sea has been recognized as a Winner of the 2026 Anisfield-Wolf Book Award, Finalist for the 2026 Griffin Poetry Prize, Finalist for the 2026 PEN/Voelcker Award for Poetry Collection, Finalist for the 2026 Virginia Literary Awards, and Longlisted for the 2025 National Book Award in Poetry.
Benjamin Bergholtz’s Swallowing a World: Globalization and the Maximalist Novel received an Honorable Mention for the 2024 Matei Calinescu Prize from the Modern Language Association.
Ira Chinoy’s Predicting the Winner: The Untold Story of Election Night 1952 and the Dawn of Computer Forecasting has been recognized as the Winner of the Eugenia Palmegiano Prize from the American Historical Association.
Saddiq Dzukogi’s Bakandamiya: An Elegy has been recognized as the Winner of the 2026 Mississippi Institute of Arts and Letters Poetry Award, Finalist for the 2025 Julie Suk Award, and Longlisted for the 2026 Nigeria Prize for Literature.
Parul Kapur’s Inside the Mirror: A Novel has been recognized as the Winner of the 2025 Pattis Family Foundation Creative Arts Book Award.
Larry C. Skogen’s To Educate American Indians: Selected Writings from the National Educational Associations Department of Indian Education, 1900-1904 has been recognized as the Winner of the 2025 Dwight L. Smith (ABC-CLIO) Award from the Western History Assocation.
Sue William Silverman’s Selected Misdemeanors: Essays at the Mercy of the Reader was Longlisted for the 2026 PEN/Diamonstein-Spielvogel Award for the Art of the Essay.
Dennis Snelling’s The Whiz Kids: How the 1950 Phillies Took the Pennant, Lost the World Series, and Changed Philadelphia Baseball Forever was recognized as the Winner of the 2026 SABR Baseball Research Award.
As Prairie Schooner celebrates it’s 100th anniversary this year, we’re thrilled to be able to publish the literary journal’s Raz/Shumaker Prairie Schooner Book Prize in Fiction and Raz/Shumaker Prairie Schooner Book Prize in Poetry series. The recent prize winners Vulture Gold: Stories by Micah Dean Hicks and Pyrrhic Symphony by Adam O. Davis were both published in September. The series editor Timothy Schaffert, a recent recipient of the 2026 Nebraska Literary Heritage Award, is also a co-editor with SJ Sindu of the Zero Street Fiction series, committed to LGBTQ+ literary fiction with commercial potential, providing marginalized authors opportunities for a wide readership in the trade fiction market. The sixth book in the series, Open Wounds: Short Stories by Samantha Moe, will be publishing in May 2027.
We’re also excited to welcome the Georgia Review Books as a recent series addition to our creative lists. Portolan: Poems by Daniela Danz and translated by Monika Cassel is the first book publishing with UNP in our fall 2026 season. Danz also recently received the Order of Merit for the Federal Republic of Germany for the values of democracy and freedom as the focus of her artistic and socio-political work. Two more books in the series are scheduled for a March 2027 publication: GHOST O’I: a novel by lawrence-minh bùi davis and One-World: A Novel by Édouard Glissant and translated by Matthew Reeck.
