Sami Rohr Prize for Jewish Literature (Choice Award), 2019: THE WORLDS WE THINK WE KNOW (story collection)
Tobias Wolff Award for Fiction: "Swan Street," 2012
Swan Street is such an original story, told
from the point of view of a woman who
has been left behind in the Old Country
while her husband pursues his fortunes in
America, waiting to send for her. Instead of
documenting her lonely life without him, she
documents his, an impossibility, unless she’s
psychic, simply imagining the details of a life
she doesn’t know, or unless it’s the husband
seeing his own life through the lens of guilt
and conscience. I’ve never read a story like
it before, and doubt I will again – it’s a rather
stunning tour de force of the imagination and
so it was an easy choice for me to make.
—Robin Hemley, Final Judge
Tobias Wolff Award for Fiction: "Swan Street," 2012
Swan Street is such an original story, told
from the point of view of a woman who
has been left behind in the Old Country
while her husband pursues his fortunes in
America, waiting to send for her. Instead of
documenting her lonely life without him, she
documents his, an impossibility, unless she’s
psychic, simply imagining the details of a life
she doesn’t know, or unless it’s the husband
seeing his own life through the lens of guilt
and conscience. I’ve never read a story like
it before, and doubt I will again – it’s a rather
stunning tour de force of the imagination and
so it was an easy choice for me to make.
—Robin Hemley, Final Judge