# PEN/Faulkner Award for Fiction

The PEN/Faulkner Award for Fiction is awarded annually by the PEN/Faulkner Foundation to the authors of the year's best works of fiction by living Americans, Green Card holders or permanent residents. The winner receives US$15,000 and each of four runners-up receives US$5000. Judges read citations for each of the finalists' works at the presentation ceremony in Washington, D.C.. The organization claims it to be "the largest peer-juried award in the country." The award was first given in 1981.
Mary Lee Settle was one of the founders of the PEN/Faulkner Award following the controversy at the 1979 National Book Award, when PEN America voted for a boycott on the grounds that the award had become too commercial.

## PEN/Faulkner Award for Fiction
### 1980s

PEN/Faulkner Award for Fiction winners, 1981–1989 :
| Year | Author | Title | Result |
| 1981 | Walter Abish | How German Is It | Winner |
| 1981 | Shirley Hazzard | The Transit of Venus | Shortlist |
| 1981 | Walker Percy | The Second Coming | Shortlist |
| 1981 | Gilbert Sorrentino | Aberration of Starlight | Shortlist |
| 1981 | John Kennedy Toole | A Confederacy of Dunces | Shortlist |
| 1982 | David Bradley | The Chaneysville Incident | Winner |
| 1982 | Donald Barthelme | Sixty Stories | Shortlist |
| 1982 | Richard Bausch | Take Me Back | Shortlist |
| 1982 | Mark Helprin | Ellis Island and Other Stories | Shortlist |
| 1982 | Marilynne Robinson | Housekeeping | Shortlist |
| 1982 | Robert Stone | A Flag for Sunrise | Shortlist |
| 1983 | Toby Olson | Seaview | Winner |
| 1983 | Maureen Howard | Grace Abounding | Shortlist |
| 1983 | Bobbie Ann Mason | Shiloh and Other Stories | Shortlist |
| 1983 | George Steiner | The Portage to San Cristobal of A.H. | Shortlist |
| 1983 | Anne Tyler | Dinner at the Homesick Restaurant | Shortlist |
| 1983 | William S. Wilson | Birthplace | Shortlist |
| 1984 | John Edgar Wideman | Sent for You Yesterday | Winner |
| 1984 | Ron Hansen | The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford | Shortlist |
| 1984 | William Kennedy | Ironweed | Shortlist |
| 1984 | Jamaica Kincaid | At the Bottom of the River | Shortlist |
| 1984 | Bernard Malamud | The Stories | Shortlist |
| 1984 | Cynthia Ozick | The Cannibal Galaxy | Shortlist |
| 1985 | Tobias Wolff | The Barracks Thief | Winner |
| 1985 | Harriet Doerr | Stones for Ibarra | Shortlist |
| 1985 | Donald Hays | The Dixie Association | Shortlist |
| 1985 | David Leavitt | Family Dancing | Shortlist |
| 1985 | James Purdy | On Glory's Course | Shortlist |
| 1986 | Peter Taylor | The Old Forest and Other Stories | Winner |
| 1986 | William Gaddis | Carpenter's Gothic | Shortlist |
| 1986 | Larry McMurtry | Lonesome Dove | Shortlist |
| 1986 | Hugh Nissenson | The Tree of Life | Shortlist |
| 1986 | Helen Norris | The Christmas Wife: Stories | Shortlist |
| 1986 | Grace Paley | Later the Same Day | Shortlist |
| 1987 | Richard Wiley | Soldiers in Hiding | Winner |
| 1987 | Richard Ford | The Sportswriter | Shortlist |
| 1987 | Maureen Howard | Expensive Habits | Shortlist |
| 1987 | Charles R. Johnson | The Sorcerer's Apprentice | Shortlist |
| 1987 | Janet Kauffman | Collaborators | Shortlist |
| 1988 | T. C. Boyle | World's End | Winner |
| 1988 | Richard Bausch | Spirits, And Other Stories | Shortlist |
| 1988 | Alice McDermott | That Night | Shortlist |
| 1988 | Cynthia Ozick | The Messiah of Stockholm | Shortlist |
| 1988 | Lawrence Thornton | Imagining Argentina | Shortlist |
| 1989 | James Salter | Dusk and Other Stories | Winner |
| 1989 | Mary McGarry Morris | Vanished | Shortlist |
| 1989 | Thomas Savage | The Corner of Rife and Pacific | Shortlist |
| 1989 | Isaac Bashevis Singer | The Death of Methuselah and Other Stories | Shortlist |

### 1990s

PEN/Faulkner Award for Fiction winners, 1990–1999 :
| Year | Author | Title | Result |
| 1990 | E. L. Doctorow | Billy Bathgate | Winner |
| 1990 | Russell Banks | Affliction | Shortlist |
| 1990 | Molly Gloss | The Jump-Off Creek | Shortlist |
| 1990 | Josephine Jacobsen | On the Island: New and Selected Stories | Shortlist |
| 1990 | Lynne Sharon Schwartz | Leaving Brooklyn | Shortlist |
| 1991 | John Edgar Wideman | Philadelphia Fire | Winner |
| 1991 | Paul Auster | The Music of Chance | Shortlist |
| 1991 | Joanne Meschery | A Gentleman's Guide to the Frontier | Shortlist |
| 1991 | Steven Millhauser | The Barnum Museum | Shortlist |
| 1991 | Joanna Scott | Arrogance | Shortlist |
| 1992 | Don DeLillo | Mao II | Winner |
| 1992 | Stephen Dixon | Frog | Shortlist |
| 1992 | Paul Gervais | Extraordinary People | Shortlist |
| 1992 | Allan Gurganus | White People | Shortlist |
| 1993 | E. Annie Proulx | Postcards | Winner |
| 1993 | Francisco Goldman | The Long Night of White Chickens | Shortlist |
| 1993 | Maureen Howard | Natural History | Shortlist |
| 1993 | Robert Olen Butler | A Good Scent from a Strange Mountain | Shortlist |
| 1993 | Sylvia Watanabe | Talking to the Dead | |
| 1994 | Philip Roth | Operation Shylock | Winner |
| 1994 | Stanley Elkin | Van Gogh's Room at Arles | Shortlist |
| 1994 | Dagoberto Gilb | The Magic of Blood | Shortlist |
| 1994 | Fae Myenne Ng | Bone | Shortlist |
| 1994 | Kate Wheeler | Not Where I Started From | Shortlist |
| 1995 | David Guterson | Snow Falling on Cedars | Winner |
| 1995 | Frederick Busch | The Children in the Woods | Shortlist |
| 1995 | Joyce Carol Oates | What I Lived For | Shortlist |
| 1995 | Ursula Hegi | Stones from the River | Shortlist |
| 1995 | Joanna Scott | Various Antidotes | Shortlist |
| 1996 | Richard Ford | Independence Day | Winner |
| 1996 | William H. Gass | The Tunnel | Shortlist |
| 1996 | Claire Messud | When The World Was Steady | Shortlist |
| 1996 | Madison Smartt Bell | All Souls' Rising | Shortlist |
| 1996 | A. J. Verdelle | The Good Negress | Shortlist |
| 1997 | Gina Berriault | Women in Their Beds | Winner |
| 1997 | Daniel Akst | St. Burl's Obituary | Shortlist |
| 1997 | Kathleen Cambor | The Book of Mercy | Shortlist |
| 1997 | Ron Hansen | Atticus | Shortlist |
| 1997 | Jamaica Kincaid | The Autobiography of My Mother | Shortlist |
| 1998 | Rafi Zabor | The Bear Comes Home | Winner |
| 1998 | Donald Antrim | The Hundred Brothers | Shortlist |
| 1998 | Rilla Askew | The Mercy Seat | Shortlist |
| 1998 | Mary Gaitskill | Because They Wanted To | Shortlist |
| 1998 | Francisco Goldman | The Ordinary Seaman | Shortlist |
| 1999 | Michael Cunningham | The Hours | Winner |
| 1999 | Russell Banks | Cloudsplitter | Shortlist |
| 1999 | Barbara Kingsolver | The Poisonwood Bible | Shortlist |
| 1999 | Brian Morton | Starting Out in the Evening | Shortlist |
| 1999 | Richard Selzer | The Doctor Stories | Shortlist |

### 2000s

PEN/Faulkner Award for Fiction winners, 2000–2009 :
| Year | Author | Title | Result |
| 2000 | Ha Jin | Waiting | Winner |
| 2000 | Frederick Busch | The Night Inspector | Shortlist |
| 2000 | Ken Kalfus | Pu-239 And Other Russian Fantasies | Shortlist |
| 2000 | Elizabeth Strout | Amy and Isabelle | Shortlist |
| 2000 | Lily Tuck | Siam, or the Woman Who Shot a Man | Shortlist |
| 2001 | Philip Roth | The Human Stain | Winner |
| 2001 | Michael Chabon | The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier and Clay | Shortlist |
| 2001 | Millicent Dillon | Harry Gold | Shortlist |
| 2001 | Denis Johnson | The Name of the World | Shortlist |
| 2001 | Mona Simpson | Off Keck Road | Shortlist |
| 2002 | Ann Patchett | Bel Canto | Winner |
| 2002 | Karen Joy Fowler | Sister Noon | Shortlist |
| 2002 | Jonathan Franzen | The Corrections | Shortlist |
| 2002 | Claire Messud | The Hunters | Shortlist |
| 2002 | Manil Suri | The Death of Vishnu | Shortlist |
| 2003 | Sabina Murray | The Caprices | Winner |
| 2003 | Peter Cameron | The City of Your Final Destination | Shortlist |
| 2003 | William Kennedy | Roscoe | Shortlist |
| 2003 | Victor LaValle | The Ecstatic | Shortlist |
| 2003 | Gilbert Sorrentino | Little Casino | Shortlist |
| 2004 | John Updike | The Early Stories: 1953-1975 | Winner |
| 2004 | Frederick Barthelme | Elroy Nights | Shortlist |
| 2004 | ZZ Packer | Drinking Coffee Elsewhere | Shortlist |
| 2004 | Caryl Phillips | A Distant Shore | Shortlist |
| 2004 | Tobias Wolff | Old School | Shortlist |
| 2005 | Ha Jin | War Trash | Winner |
| 2005 | Jerome Charyn | The Green Lantern | Shortlist |
| 2005 | Edwidge Danticat | The Dew Breaker | Shortlist |
| 2005 | Marilynne Robinson | Gilead | Shortlist |
| 2005 | Steve Yarbrough | Prisoners of War | Shortlist |
| 2006 | E. L. Doctorow | The March | Winner |
| 2006 | Karen Fisher | A Sudden Country | Shortlist |
| 2006 | William Henry Lewis | I Got Somebody in Staunton | Shortlist |
| 2006 | James Salter | Last Night | Shortlist |
| 2006 | Bruce Wagner | The Chrysanthemum Palace | Shortlist |
| 2007 | Philip Roth | Everyman | Winner |
| 2007 | Charles D'Ambrosio | The Dead Fish Museum | Shortlist |
| 2007 | Deborah Eisenberg | Twilight of the Superheroes | Shortlist |
| 2007 | Amy Hempel | The Collected Stories of Amy Hempel | Shortlist |
| 2007 | Edward P. Jones | All Aunt Hagar's Children | Shortlist |
| 2008 | Kate Christensen | The Great Man | Winner |
| 2008 | Annie Dillard | The Maytrees | Shortlist |
| 2008 | David Leavitt | The Indian Clerk | Shortlist |
| 2008 | T. M. McNally | The Gateway | Shortlist |
| 2008 | Ron Rash | Chemistry and Other Stories | Shortlist |
| 2009 | Joseph O'Neill | Netherland | Winner |
| 2009 | Sarah Shun-lien Bynum | Ms. Hempel Chronicles | Shortlist |
| 2009 | Susan Choi | A Person of Interest | Shortlist |
| 2009 | Richard Price | Lush Life | Shortlist |
| 2009 | Ron Rash | Serena | Shortlist |

### 2010s

PEN/Faulkner Award for Fiction winners, 2010–2019 :
| Year | Author | Title | Result |
| 2010 | Sherman Alexie | War Dances | Winner |
| 2010 | Barbara Kingsolver | The Lacuna | Shortlist |
| 2010 | Lorraine Lopéz | Homicide Survivors Picnic | Shortlist |
| 2010 | Lorrie Moore | A Gate at the Stairs | Shortlist |
| 2010 | Colson Whitehead | Sag Harbor | Shortlist |
| 2011 | Deborah Eisenberg | The Collected Stories of Deborah Eisenberg | Winner |
| 2011 | Jennifer Egan | A Visit from the Goon Squad | Shortlist |
| 2011 | Jaimy Gordon | Lord of Misrule | Shortlist |
| 2011 | Eric Puchner | Model Home | Shortlist |
| 2011 | Brad Watson | Aliens in the Prime of Their Lives: Stories | Shortlist |
| 2012 | Julie Otsuka | The Buddha in the Attic | Winner |
| 2012 | Russell Banks | Lost Memory of Skin | Shortlist |
| 2012 | Don DeLillo | The Angel Esmeralda | Shortlist |
| 2012 | Anita Desai | The Artist of Disappearance | Shortlist |
| 2012 | Steven Millhauser | We Others: New and Selected Stories | Shortlist |
| 2013 | Benjamin Alire Sáenz | Everything Begins and Ends at the Kentucky Club | Winner |
| 2013 | Amelia Gray | THREATS | Shortlist |
| 2013 | Laird Hunt | Kind One | Shortlist |
| 2013 | T. Geronimo Johnson | Hold It 'Til It Hurts | Shortlist |
| 2013 | Thomas Mallon | Watergate | Shortlist |
| 2014 | Karen Joy Fowler | We Are All Completely Beside Ourselves | Winner |
| 2014 | Daniel Alarcón | At Night We Walk in Circles | Shortlist |
| 2014 | Percival Everett | Percival Everett by Virgil Russell | Shortlist |
| 2014 | Joan Silber | Fools | Shortlist |
| 2014 | Valerie Trueblood | Search Party: Stories of Rescue | Shortlist |
| 2015 | Atticus Lish | Preparation for the Next Life | Winner |
| 2015 | Jeffrey Renard Allen | Song of the Shank | Shortlist |
| 2015 | Jennifer Clement | Prayers for the Stolen | Shortlist |
| 2015 | Jenny Offill | Dept. of Speculation | Shortlist |
| 2015 | Emily St. John Mandel | Station Eleven | Shortlist |
| 2016 | James Hannaham | Delicious Foods | Winner |
| 2016 | Julie Iromuanya | Mr. and Mrs. Doctor | Shortlist |
| 2016 | Viet Thanh Nguyen | The Sympathizer | Shortlist |
| 2016 | Elizabeth Tallent | Mendocino Fire: Stories | Shortlist |
| 2016 | Luis Alberto Urrea | The Water Museum: Stories | Shortlist |
| 2017 | Imbolo Mbue | Behold the Dreamers | Winner |
| 2017 | Viet Dinh | After Disasters | Shortlist |
| 2017 | Louise Erdrich | LaRose | Shortlist |
| 2017 | Garth Greenwell | What Belongs to You | Shortlist |
| 2017 | Sunil Yapa | Your Heart is a Muscle the Size of a Fist | Shortlist |
| 2018 | Joan Silber | Improvement | Winner |
| 2018 | Hernán Diaz | In the Distance | Shortlist |
| 2018 | Samantha Hunt | The Dark Dark | Shortlist |
| 2018 | Achy Obejas | The Tower of the Antilles | Shortlist |
| 2018 | Jesmyn Ward | Sing, Unburied, Sing | Shortlist |
| 2019 | Azareen Van der Vliet Oloomi | Call Me Zebra | Winner |
| 2019 | Blanche McCrary Boyd | Tomb of the Unknown Racist | Shortlist |
| 2019 | Richard Powers | The Overstory | Shortlist |
| 2019 | Ivelisse Rodriguez | Love War Stories | Shortlist |
| 2019 | Willy Vlautin | Don't Skip Out on Me | Shortlist |

### 2020s

PEN/Faulkner Award for Fiction winners, 2020–2029 :
| Year | Author | Title | Result |
| 2020 | Chloe Aridjis | Sea Monsters | Winner |
| 2020 | Yiyun Li | Where Reasons End | Shortlist |
| 2020 | Peter Rock | The Night Swimmers | Shortlist |
| 2020 | Maurice Carlos Ruffin | We Cast a Shadow | Shortlist |
| 2020 | Ocean Vuong | On Earth We're Briefly Gorgeous | Shortlist |
| 2021 | Deesha Philyaw | The Secret Lives of Church Ladies | Winner |
| 2021 | Matthew Salesses | Disappear Doppelgänger Disappear | Shortlist |
| 2021 | Rufi Thorpe | The Knockout Queen | Shortlist |
| 2021 | Robin Wasserman | Mother Daughter Widow Wife | Shortlist |
| 2021 | Steve Wiegenstein | Scattered Lights | Shortlist |
| 2022 | Rabih Alameddine | The Wrong End of the Telescope | Winner |
| 2022 | Nawaaz Ahmed | Radiant Fugitives | Shortlist |
| 2022 | Carolyn Ferrell | Dear Miss Metropolitan | Shortlist |
| 2022 | Imbolo Mbue | How Beautiful We Were | Shortlist |
| 2022 | Carolina de Robertis | The President and the Frog | Shortlist |
| 2023 | Yiyun Li | The Book of Goose | Winner |
| 2023 | Jonathan Escoffery | If I Survive You | Shortlist |
| 2023 | Laura Warrell | Sweet, Soft, Plenty Rhythm | Shortlist |
| 2023 | Dionne Irving | The Islands | Shortlist |
| 2023 | Kathryn Harlan | Fruiting Bodies: Stories | Shortlist |
| 2024 | Claire Jiménez | What Happened to Ruthy Ramirez | Winner |
| 2024 | Jamel Brinkley | Witness | Shortlist |
| 2024 | Henry Hoke | Open Throat | Shortlist |
| 2024 | Alice McDermott | Absolution | Shortlist |
| 2024 | Colin Winnette | Users | Shortlist |
| 2025 | Percival Everett | James | Shortlist |
| 2025 | Danzy Senna | Colored Television | Shortlist |
| 2025 | Pemi Aguda | Ghostroots | Shortlist |
| 2025 | Garth Greenwell | Small Rain | Shortlist |
| 2025 | Susan Muaddi Darraj | Behind You Is the Sea | Shortlist |