Lambda Literary is thrilled to announce Federico Erebia and River 瑩瑩 Dandelion as the winners of the 2024 Judith A. Markowitz Award for Exceptional New LGBTQ Writers.
Lambda Literary has played a pivotal role in nurturing the development of exceptional new LGBTQ writers through the Writers Retreat for Emerging LGBTQ Voices, internships, and writing and performance opportunities. Supporting emerging LGBTQ writers is central to our mission: they are the future of LGBTQ literature.
The Judith A. Markowitz Award for Exceptional New LGBTQ Writers recognizes LGBTQ-identified writers whose work demonstrates their strong potential for promising careers. The award includes a cash prize of $1,500.
About Federico Erebia
Federico Erebia is a retired physician, woodworker, author, poet, and illustrator. He received a BA from the College of Wooster, and an MD from Brown University.
He is the recipient of Lambda Literary’s 2024 Judith A. Markowitz Award for Exceptional New LGBTQ Writer. His debut novel, Pedro & Daniel (Levine Querido 2023) is longlisted for the 2024 Massachusetts Book Award; is “A Must Read Title” at the Massachusetts Center for the Book, a Library of Congress affiliate; is a 2023 Kirkus Reviews Best of the Year; and was featured on NPR’s Weekend Edition. It received starred reviews from Kirkus, Publishers Weekly, and Shelf Awareness.
Erebia is on the SCBWI Impact & Legacy Fund’s steering committee, where he created the School Librarian’s Mini Library grants: In less than two years, over 600 books by and/or about marginalized or underrepresented individuals have been sent to twenty-one schools, reaching over twenty thousand students. He is on the board of Read Your World, Inc. He is a member of several other writing groups.
He identifies as intersectional: he is gay, Mexican American, and neurodivergent. He and his husband live near Boston, Massachusetts.
On Erebia’s work, a judge remarked:
Writing for children comes with a moral imperative impossible to ignore: writing inclusively, openly, honestly, and kindly about the realities children experience, including trauma, questions of identity, familial relationships, and more. Erebia’s deeply engaging blend of poetry and prose lovingly and thoughtfully does exactly this, examining experiences as well as neurodiversity, Latine (specifically Mexican) diaspora, and queerness in a way that centers intersectionality and is accessible for readers of all ages. The concerns of Erebia’s writing are echoed in his community engagement in diversifying kidlit in multiple organizations, which is particularly vital in this era of book banning. Writers come from all stages in life, and we are delighted to support Erebia’s second career.
Watch Federico's Acceptance Speech
About River 瑩瑩 Dandelion
River 瑩瑩 Dandelion is a practitioner of ancestral medicine through writing poetry, teaching, filmmaking, energy healing, and creating ceremony. As a poet, he writes to connect with the unseen and unspoken so we can feel and heal. As a filmmaker, he creates poetic and narrative films that center emotional safety, trans joy, and intergenerational healing. As a healing arts practitioner, he activates energy healing to help clients move through transition and transformation. Winner of the 2024 Judith Markowitz Prize for Exceptional New LGBTQ Writers, River is the author of remembering (y)our light, his debut chapbook on honoring matriarchs and ancestors across generations.
River has been awarded residencies and fellowships from Headlands Center for the Arts, Tin House, Lambda Literary, Kundiman, Third World Newsreel, Bread Loaf Environmental Writers’ Conference, and more. He has performed and presented his work globally at venues including Dodge Poetry Festival, Museum of the City of New York, and the University of Havana. His work is published in numerous journals and anthologies. His poetic film, Spells for Safety, premiered at the Newark LGBTQ Film Festival. River loves to swim and does this work for queer and trans ancestors and descendants to come. For more, visit: riverdandelion.com.
On Dandelion’s work, a judge commented:
Masterful poetry echoes thematic concerns within its form, word choice, imagery, and structure, and Chan’s work exhibits these characteristics with a deft and thoughtful hand. Meditations on lineage (both familial and otherwise), language, community, Asian (specifically Chinese) diaspora, desire, and gender are reinforced with choices in every line. It is obvious Chan’s community work feeds into his creative work and vice-versa, thinking through intersectionality by blending the personal with the sociopolitical. He builds space for queer and trans writers both within his poetry and outside, in his curation and creation of multimedia art, approach to pedagogy, anti-racist workshops, and community building. Chan is a shining example of who this prize is meant to highlight.
