The Washington Center for the Book (an affiliate of the Library of Congress Center for the Book administered by Washington State Library) has announced the winners of the 2025 Washington State Book Awards. Now in its 59th year, the program (formerly called the Governor’s Writers Awards) celebrates writers of all stripes, and the winners were chosen from 42 finalists in seven categories: creative nonfiction/memoir, fiction, general nonfiction/biography, poetry, picture books, books for young readers, and young adult literature. 

“Each year we have five judges for adult books and three judges for books for youth,” explains Sara Peté, director at Washington Center for the Book. “Judges can serve up to three consecutive years but can sometimes only serve one or two years due to their schedules. Our judges are librarians and library workers, booksellers, and Washington state authors.”

This year’s judges included regional librarians Sarah Jaffa, Sarah Morrison, Emma Radosevich, and Robin Bradford, and 2022 WSBA finalist and author Marcus Harrison Green. Judges for the youth titles were school librarians Lauren Kessel, Louise Chambers, and Jen Haas, Librarian. A total of 271 books were submitted for judging across both adult and youth categories. The adult title judges collectively read and evaluated the submissions (each is assigned one-fifth of the titles to read and from which they nominate finalists and winners). The youth judges followed the same process, each taking on one-third of the books.

“The Washington State Book Awards honor works of outstanding literary merit by Washington authors,” Peté says. “We are particularly interested in prioritizing excellent works created by authors of communities that have been historically marginalized and excluded. The 2025 WSBA winners make up a really beautiful snapshot of the breadth and depth of works being created in our state. I love how the genres, formats, settings, cultures, and styles of these works are all over the map, with the thread of excellent storytelling connecting them all.”

Congratulations to all of this year’s winners! Read the complete list below:

Creative Nonfiction/Memoir Winner:
Feeding Ghosts: A Graphic Memoir by Tessa Hulls of Seattle/Port Townsend
(MCD)

Fiction Winner:
Rough Trade by Katrina Carrasco of Seattle
(MCD/Farrar, Straus & Giroux)

General Nonfiction/Biography Winner:
Be A Revolution by Ijeoma Oluo of Seattle
(HarperOne)

Poetry Winner:
Something About Living by Lena Khalaf Tuffaha of Redmond
(The University of Akron Press)

Picture Books Winner:
Daughter of the Light-Footed People by Belen Medina of Vancouver and Natalia Rojas Castro
(Atheneum – Simon & Schuster)

Books for Young Readers Winner:
Table Titans Club by Scott Kurtz of Bothell
(Holiday House Publishing)

Young Adult Literature Winner:
Looking for Smoke by K.A. Cobell of Olympia
(Heartdrum, an imprint of HarperCollins Publishers)