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Minnesota Book Awards Past Finalists and Winners - 2008
1988 | 1989 | 1991* | 1992 | 1993 | 1994 | 1995 | 1996 | 1997 | 1998
1999 | 2000 | 2001 | 2002 | 2003 | 2004 | 2005 | 2006 | 2007 | 2008 | 2009
*Note: No awards were held in 1990.
Please also note that the award winners listed for each year were awarded in the year following publication (i.e. winners published in 2007 were announced in 2008 at the 20th Annual Minnesota Book Awards).
(Winners indicated by the 
icon; all others are Finalists)
2008 Award for Children’s Literature
Sponsored by Xcel Energy
Lynne Jonell
Emmy and the Incredible Shrinking Rat
Henry Holt and Company
Catherine Friend
The Perfect Nest
Candlewick Press
Jill Kalz
Farmer Cap
Picture Window Books*
Mia Posada
Guess What Is Growing Inside This Egg
Millbrook Press/Lerner Publishing Group*
2008 Award for General Nonfiction
Sponsored by Meyer, Scherer & Rockcastle, Ltd.
Charles Baxter
The Art of Subtext: Beyond Plot
Graywolf Press*
James Dawes
That the World May Know: Bearing Witness to Atrocity
Harvard University Press
Wing Young Huie
Looking for Asian America: An Ethnocentric Tour
University of Minnesota Press*
Jim Walsh
The Replacements: All Over But the Shouting – An Oral History
Voyageur Press/MBI Publishing Company*
2008 Award for Minnesota
Sponsored by Marquette Financial Companies
Doug Hoverson
Land of Amber Waters: The History of Brewing in Minnesota
University of Minnesota Press*
Annette Atkins
Creating Minnesota: A History from the Inside Out
Minnesota Historical Society Press*
Mike Lynch
Mike Lynch’s Minnesota Weatherwatch: A Complete Guide for Weather-Obsessed Minnesotans
Voyageur Press/MBI Publishing Company*
Bruce White
We Are at Home: Pictures of the Ojibwe People
Minnesota Historical Society Press*
2008 Award for Young Adult Literature
Will Weaver
Defect
Farrar, Straus and Giroux
Nancy Crocker
Billie Standish Was Here
Simon & Schuster Books for Young Readers
Patrick Jones
Chasing Tail Lights
Walker & Company
Alison McGhee
Falling Boy
Picador/St. Martin’s Press
2008 Award for Poetry
Deborah Keenan
Willow Room, Green Door
Milkweed Editions*
Éireann Lorsung
Music for Landing Planes By
Milkweed Editions*
Leslie Adrienne Miller
The Resurrection Trade
Graywolf Press*
William Reichard
This Brightness
Mid-List Press*
2008 Award for Memoir & Creative Nonfiction
Sponsored by Wellington Management, Inc.
Patricia Hampl
The Florist’s Daughter
Harcourt
Kevin Kling
The Dog Says How
Borealis Books/Minnesota Historical Society Press*
Joni Tevis
The Wet Collection
Milkweed Editions*
Catherine Watson
Home on the Road: Further Dispatches from the Ends of the Earth
Syren Book Company*
2008 Award for Novel & Short Story
Wang Ping
The Last Communist Virgin
Coffee House Press*
Garrison Keillor
Pontoon
Viking Penguin/Penguin Group
Lorna Landvik
The View from Mount Joy
Ballantine Books/The Random House Publishing Group
Heather McElhatton
Pretty Little Mistakes
HarperCollins Publishers
2008 Award for Genre Fiction
William Kent Krueger
Thunder Bay
Atria Books/Simon & Schuster
Philip Donlay
Code Black
iBooks
Vince Flynn
Protect and Defend
Atria Books/Simon & Schuster
Mary Logue
Maiden Rock
Bleak House Books/Big Earth Publishing
2008 Readers' Choice Award (selected by online voters from across the state)
Jill Kalz
Farmer Cap
Picture Window Books*
* Denotes a Minnesota-based Publisher
The Minnesota Book Awards is a Capital City project, led by The Friends of the Saint Paul Public Library,
in consortium with the Saint Paul Public Library and the Mayor’s office in the City of Saint Paul.
Outreach partners for the Book Awards include the Metropolitan Library Service Agency (MELSA)
and the Minnesota Library Association (MLA).