Finalists have been selected in two categories for the 2025 Dayton Literary Peace Prize, honoring "writers whose work uses the power of the written word to foster peace, social justice, and global understanding." Winners are awarded $10,000, and the first runners-up receive $5,000. The winners and the Richard C. Holbrooke Distinguished Achievement Award will be named in September. The winners, first runners-up, and other finalists will be honored at an awards ceremony in Dayton, Ohio, the weekend of November 8-9. This year's finalists are:
Nonfiction
The Burning Earth: An Environmental History of the Last 500 Years by Sunil Amrith (W.W. Norton)
John Lewis: A Life by David Greenberg (Simon & Schuster)
Solidarity: The Past, Present, and Future of a World-Changing Idea by Leah Hunt-Hendrix and Astra Taylor (Pantheon)
Nuclear War: A Scenario by Annie Jacobsen (Dutton)
A Map of Future Ruins: On Borders and Belonging by Lauren Markham (Riverhead)
The Home I Worked to Make: Voices from the New Syrian Diaspora by Wendy Pearlman (Liveright)
Fiction
Black Butterflies by Priscilla Morris (Knopf)
James by Percival Everett (Doubleday)
Martyr! by Kaveh Akbar (Knopf)
Freedom Is a Feast by Alejandro Puyana (Little, Brown)
The Women by Kristin Hannah (St. Martin's Press)
The Good Deed by Helen Benedict (Red Hen Press)