April 1st, 2026 — PEN America recently highlighted the experiences of PEN Open Book Award recipients, writers who go on to become PEN Open Book Award Affiliated Fellows at Civitella Ranieri the following fellowship season. The PEN Open Book Award is a $10,000 prize created to expand racial and ethnic diversity within the literary and publishing communities. The award has no restrictions on genre: In recent years, authors have taken it home for novels, experimental memoirs, poetry, and vignette collections.
2026 PEN Open Book Awardee
Last night, Civitella had the pleasure of attending the 62nd PEN Literary Awards where the 2025 winner of the PEN Open Book Award was announced: Justin Haynes, author of Ibis, a cross-generational Caribbean story of migration, superstition, and a search for family.
We look forward to welcoming Justin to the Castle in 2027!
“A Wonderful Spotlight”
PEN America spoke with Asako Serizawa (CRF 2022), 2021 winner of the Open Book Award and recent judge of the award. The residency was “magical,” Asako said, highlighting the opportunity to speak with other artists and find points of intersection across their projects.
Divya Victor (CRF 2023), who received the PEN Open Book Award for in 2022, described her six weeks at Civitella as “profound and transformative.” It was the first time in her life she could write without working another job—and coupled with the self-assurance the award gave her, the scale of her ambition expanded, she said to PEN. During her time at Civitella, Victor turned her attention to Kin, a collection of essays that explores kinship catalysts in the South Asian diaspora. Graywolf Press will publish the collection next spring.
