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JANUARY 2020
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70 Titles Listed
“It’s the Work”
John Bragg, winner of the
2019 BookLife PrizeFiction Contest, discusses
writing his novel Exit 8
BY MATIA MADRONA QUERYT
his year, the judges of the BookLife
Prize—successful authors, the editorial
staffs of Publishers Weekly and BookLife,
and PW reviewers—looked at 730 submissions
before selecting just five titles (one from
each of the contest’s categories) for the
finals. The finalist from the general fiction
category, Exit 8, was ultimately selected as
the grand prize winner. Exit 8 centers on a
Vermont farmer in 1963 who faces the loss
of his family’s land and legacy as a result of
the expansion of the highway system.
A PW reviewer’s critic’s report for Exit 8
praised the novel, saying that “emotion per-
meates this quiet, yet deeply impactful, work
of fiction.” And author and BookLife Prize
judge Adam Pelzman called Exit 8 “a poignant
and beautifully written novel, a heart-wrench-
ing story of one man’s voiceless, yet dignified,
battle against the advances of modern society.”
Though Exit 8 certainly establishes Bragg’s
credentials as a writer, he has always been