The Jim Duggins Outstanding Mid-Career Novelist Prize honors LGBTQ-identified authors who have published multiple novels, built a strong reputation and following, and show promise to continue publishing high quality work for years to come. This award is made possible by the Horizons Foundation, and includes a cash prize of $5,000.
One of two winners of this year’s prize, Kristen Arnett is the queer Floridian author of the novels STOP ME IF YOU’VE HEARD THIS ONE (Riverhead Books, 2025) which was a finalist for the Southern Book Prize, was shortlisted for the Comedy Women in Print Prize, and was awarded a silver medal from The Florida Book Awards, With Teeth (Riverhead Books, 2021) which was a finalist for the Lambda Literary Award in fiction.
And the New York Times bestselling debut Mostly Dead Things (Tin House, 2019) which was also a finalist for the Lambda Literary Award in fiction and was shortlisted for the VCU Cabell First Novelist Award. She was awarded a Shearing Fellowship at Black Mountain Institute, has held residencies at Ragdale Foundation, Vermont Studio Center, the Millay Colony, and the Studios of Key West, and was longlisted for the Joyce Carol Oates Prize. She is the Florida Chair for Authors Against Book Bans. Her upcoming short fiction collection, Party at the End of the World, will be published by Riverhead Books in Spring 2027. She has a Masters in Library and Information Science from Florida State University and lives in Orlando, Florida. We get to know Kristen in a quick 5 Questions interview below.
Q1: What is queer resistance to you in literature?
The simple act of writing queer stories feels like resistance to me. Every time I actively engage in making work I’m doing something important. I try to keep that fact at the forefront of my mind, so that on the days when writing feels like lugging around an anvil I can remember that art is hard because it’s supposed to be. If it wasn’t difficult, it wouldn’t be worth it. Writing is about loving people, about engaging in the act of being human. It’s messy and terrible sometimes, but that means we know we’re alive. Resistance is an act of community, and writing about our community is a form of collective care. I’m so lucky to be part of something so much bigger than myself. I’m not alone and that’s a deeply beautiful thing.
Q2: What is the most impactful piece of queer literature that has resonated with you, and why?
I feel like I’ve told this story a million times, but I never get tired of it: Dorthy Allison’s Bastard out of Carolina is the book that made me want to be a writer. It’s the novel that let me know I could do it; almost like it gave me permission. The queerness in that book, the ache of feeling understood and seen in a way that hadn’t happened to me before? That was startling and explosive. Absolutely life-changing. I consider myself very much to be a place writer. Florida is home to me and is embedded in everything I do. Reading Dorothy’s South Carolina felt like seeing the myriad ways I might write about home. How I could unpack Florida forever, if I felt so inclined.
Q3: What do you hope queer readers take from your writing?
I hope they laugh! I feel like all my books are funny. They’re about a lot of different things: grief and loss, family and the ways we hurt and love each other (sometimes simultaneously), intimacy, vulnerability, how we communicate (or how we choose not to), but ultimately I’m very interested in the way tone sits inside of all these lived experiences. And I’m always fascinated by how many ways you can tell a joke. I want readers to feel like I’m right there with them, sharing a drink and a good time together. Even if that good time comes with a lot of baggage.
Q4: How have your lived experiences impacted the stories you tell?
Everything that’s happened in my life has crafted me into the artist that I am today. I’m deeply grateful for everything that came before; even all the stuff that was incredibly difficult. I grew up closeted in an extremely conservative evangelical household. I had a baby when I was just out of high school and then immediately came out as a lesbian. I supported myself and my son working in libraries full-time while I put myself through college at night. I wrote in little pockets on lunch breaks or before bed, slivers of time. I applied to every writing workshop, submitted work, made friends, built community. I’m so unbelievably lucky that people have supported and championed my art through all of this. I said already that I write because I love people, and I deeply mean that. Even with everything horrible and awful all the time, I could not write without the little spark of hope that lives inside me. Small moments. Writing stories was something that got me through all those terrible times. To get to share that art with other people is an indescribable feeling.
Q5: Which queer figures have inspired you throughout your journey as a writer?
We have such a multitude of incredible queer artists and so many of them have directly influenced my work: Dorothy Allison, Alex Chee, Carmen Maria Machado, Torrey Peters, Emma Copley Eisenberg, Tommy Pico, Sabrina Imbler, Julia Armfield, Melissa Febos, Edgar Gomez, T Kira Māhealani Madden, Jaquira Díaz, Samantha Irby, Lori Ostlund, Bryan Washington, Sarah Schulman, Isle McElroy, Lydi Conklin, the list goes on and on and on! I’d also like to add my wife, the writer Kayla Kumari Upadhyaya. She inspires me every day. I’m so goddamn lucky.
