The Zora Neale Hurston/Richard Wright Foundation has announced their nominees for the 2007 Hurston/Wright Legacy Award for Black Literature, which include Unbowed by Wangari Maathai, Half of a Yellow Sun by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie, and Wizard of the Crow by Ngugi wa Thiong'o. This is the first national award presented to published writers of African descent by the national community of Black writers. The award, underwritten by Borders Books & Music, consists of prizes for the highest quality writing in the categories of Fiction, Debut Fiction, Nonfiction, and Contemporary Fiction. The Awards Ceremony will be held at the National Press Club in Washington DC on November 2.

Civil War historian James M. McPherson has been awarded the first Pritzker Military Library Literary Award, a $100,000 prize presented for lifetime accomplishments in military history. Professor emeritus of history at Princeton University, McPherson won the Pulitzer Prize for Battle Cry of Freedom, and he is also the author of Hallowed Ground, The Negro's Civil War, and What They Fought For 1861-1865. The prize will be presented in October.