A Win for the "The Residue Years"

The Baton Rouge Area Foundation has named author Mitchell S. Jackson the winner of the 2014 Ernest J. Gaines Award for Literary Excellence. Jackson’s novel, The Residue Years, is a semi-autobiographical account of his own youth in Portland, Oregon, where the novel is set. The book describes the life of a former addict as she attempts to steer her three children away from similarly addiction-riddled lives.

Though the subject matter is intense and dark at times, Jackson said it wasn't terribly difficult to put together these pieces from his past. “I've been writing this book since '98, and I wrote some of it while I was in jail,” he admitted. “I wrote it from every perspective I could try—first person, third person, all of them—to see which one would work best.” The most difficult part, he said, was writing the ending. “I'd had an ending in mind for this since I started the book, and when I was almost done with it I realized that ending wouldn't work, so I had to change it,” he explained.

Jackson earned his master’s degree in writing from Portland State University and a master’s in creative writing from New York University; he has earned fellowships from the Urban Artists Initiative, the Lannan Foundation, and The Center For Fiction. He has also previously won the Hurston Wright Foundation Award for college writers.

The Residue Years has also garnered acclaim from The New York Times, The Times of London, Sydney Morning Herald, and O, the Oprah Magazine. It was a finalist for several other literary awards as well, including the Flaherty-Dunnan First Novel Prize, the PEN/Hemingway Award for debut fiction, and the Hurston-Wright Legacy Award for best fiction by a writer of African descent.

Now in its eighth year, the Ernest J. Gaines Award for Literary Excellence is an annual $10,000 prize given to rising African-American fiction writers, while also honoring Gaines' enduring contribution to literature. "The judges were thrilled this year with the quality of submissions," said Jessica A. Boone, senior donor services officer at the Baton Rouge Area Foundation, "so much that they short-listed four other books. Mitchell Jackson’s book was selected because of compelling, outstanding storytelling."

“It's a real honor to be chosen for this award just because of who Ernest Gaines is,” said Jackson. “To be included in the list of all the past winners is really amazing for me too, especially since a lot of them seem to be Southern-themed.”

The award ceremony for Mitchell S. Jackson will be held at 6:30 p.m. on January 22 at the Manship Theatre in downtown Baton Rouge. It is free and open to the public, but reservations are required. Learn more about the judges, the ceremony, and The Residue Years at ErnestJGainesAward.org.