St. Paul memoirist Kao Kalia Yang is one of six finalists for the prestigious Chautauqua Prize. Yang's book was also a finalist for the National Book Critics Circle Award. It is a memoir about the life of her father, Bee Yang, a traditional Hmong song poet.
The six finalists are:
"The General vs. The President: MacArthur and Truman at the Brink of Nuclear War," by H.W. Brands (Doubleday)
"The Fortunes," by Peter Ho Davies (Houghton Mifflin Harcourt)
"Blood River Rising: The Thompson-Crimson Feud of the 1920s," by Victoria Pope Hubbell (Iris Press)
"Underground Airlines," by Ben H. Winters (Mulholland Books)
"American Character: A History of the Epic Struggle Between Individual Liberty and the Common Good," by Colin Woodard (Viking)
"The Song Poet: A Memoir of My Father," by Kao Kalia Yang (Metropolitan Books)
The prize, now in its sixth year, carries an award of $7,500 and a summer residency at the Chautauqua Institution in New York. The prize honors a book that provides a richly rewarding reading experience and a writer who ofers a significant contribution to the literary arts.
The winner will be announced in May.
St. Paul memoirist Kao Kalia Yang is one of six finalists for the prestigious Chautauqua Prize. Yang's book was also a finalist for the National Book Critics Circle Award.
