Winning Writers Announces the Winners of the 11th Annual North Street Book Prize

NORTHAMPTON, Mass., Feb. 16, 2026 /PRNewswire/ -- Winning Writers is pleased to announce the results from its eleventh annual North Street Book Prize competition. This contest recognizes the best books being self-published or hybrid-published today. 1,734 books were received from around the world.

Teresa Tennyson of North Sandwich, New Hampshire, won this year's Grand Prize across all genres for her speculative novel Five Years, which focuses on a small New England town's response to humanity's imminent extinction as bees and other key flora and fauna succumb to climate change and ecological degradation. Ending on a tentatively hopeful note, this absorbing tale is a testament to the value of democratic norms, especially at times when we are most tempted to abandon them.

Teresa received $10,000, a marketing analysis and one-hour phone consultation with Carolyn Howard-Johnson, a $500 credit at BookBaby, two blurbs from published authors as part of the Atmosphere Press Blurb Matchmaking program, a public author interview at atmospherepress.com, free lodging at the Atmosphere Press oceanside condo in Playa Flamingo, Costa Rica, free developmental editing, copyediting, and proofreading from Gatekeeper Press, three months of Pro service (a $207 value) and a $250 account credit from Book Award Pro, a book cover consultation from Laura Duffy Design (a $1,100 value), and 3 free ads in the Winning Writers newsletter (a $525 value).

• Geir and Kate Jordahl of Bellingham, Washington, won First Prize–Art Book for The Endless Sphere of Time, which pairs circular black-and-white photographs of liminal spaces in nature and architecture with poetry by Norwegian modernist Rolf Jacobsen, translated by Roger Greenwald.
• Katherine Lockwood of Sandwich, Massachusetts, won First Prize–Children's Picture Book for My Body Beeps! Growing Up with Diabetes, about an active little girl who just wants to play hide-and-seek like her other friends, but she is worried about the sound of her glucose monitor giving her away.
• Ben Stubenberg of the Turks & Caicos Islands won First Prize–Creative Nonfiction & Memoir for The Jamaican Bobsled Captain, a fast-paced, character-driven work of narrative journalism that tells the real story behind the Olympic team that inspired the 1990s Disney comedy Cool Runnings.
• Jessica Mann of Driggs, Idaho, won First Prize–Genre Fiction for her ecological fantasy novel Uplift, a story of interspecies cooperation through the coming-of-age journey of a Clark's Nutcracker, a bird of the high mountains of the American West and a member of the crow family.
• Jacoby A. Matott of Chippewa Falls, Wisconsin, won First Prize–Graphic Novel & Memoir for Pumpkin Guts: The Hellbound Halloween, a colorfully grotesque homage to teen slasher movies, set at a cursed carnival on Halloween night.
• Rashid Darden of Conway, North Carolina, won First Prize–Mainstream/Literary Fiction for A Peculiar Legacy, a loving portrayal of a tight-knit Black neighborhood in Washington, DC, where a newly arrived gay couple and a Quaker matriarch do their best to mentor the local teenagers after one of the youths is murdered.
• Michael Wardner of Pine Lake, Georgia, won First Prize–Middle Grade for Kris Kringle and the Great Magic Swindle, a witty romp about Santa and his friends battling a villainous magician.
• Kathleen Spivack of Watertown, Massachusetts, won First Prize–Poetry for Homage, a chapbook composed of tributes to guiding figures in her life as an artist.

The category winners each received $1,000, a marketing analysis and one-hour phone consultation with Carolyn Howard-Johnson, a $300 credit at BookBaby, a public author interview at atmospherepress.com, 50% off developmental editing, copyediting, and proofreading from Gatekeeper Press, three months of Pro service from Book Award Pro (a $207 value), design for a custom merchandise item based on the winner's book cover from Laura Duffy Design, and one free ad in the Winning Writers newsletter (a $175 value); the winning children's picture book author also received a phone consultation from April Cox at Self-Publishing Made Simple (a $289 value) and access to Authorpreneur Summit sessions (an $89 value).

Ten Honorable Mentions of $500 and three months of Pro service from Book Award Pro (a $207 value) each went to Dr. Ramiro F. Prudencio, Cassie Brooks, Bryce Craps, Dr. Joanne Intrator, Elizabeth Hatton, Michael Paul Johnson, Marc Hess and Ira Bobrovska, Atukunda Rachael Mutabingwa, Helen Stine, and Christie Max Williams. The honorable mention children's picture book authors also received phone consultations from April Cox at Self-Publishing Made Simple (a $289 value) and access to Authorpreneur Summit sessions (an $89 value).

These finalists are also recognized. They each received a free private critique from Winning Writers, a $90-$240 value: Rachael Sokolowski and Suz Karchmer, Nicole Kohr, Hopey LJ and Kathryn Llewellyn, Maria Lucas, Jan Baross, Megan Williams, Rhoda Berlin, Eric James Fullilove, Francis Gary Powers, Jr. and Walter Pfenninger, Paula Friedman, and Mary G. Verrill.

The judges' remarks and excerpts from the winning entries are published on the Winning Writers website. $23,000 in cash was awarded in all. This contest is distinguished by its large cash prizes, the substantial benefits provided by the co-sponsors, the feedback offered to every contestant who submits online, and its honest public critiques of winning entries, unafraid to point out where a great book could have been even better.

The twelfth North Street competition is open now with a deadline of July 1, 2026. The entry fee is $95 per book. All entrants will receive free gifts from the contest's co-sponsors—Carolyn Howard-Johnson, BookBaby, Atmosphere Press, Gatekeeper Press, Book Award Pro, Laura Duffy Design, and Self-Publishing Made Simple.

Founded in 2001, Winning Writers is a partner member of the Alliance of Independent Authors. In addition to the North Street Book Prize, Winning Writers also sponsors the Tom Howard/John H. Reid Fiction & Essay Contest, the Tom Howard/Margaret Reid Poetry Contest, and the Wergle Flomp Humor Poetry Contest (no fee). All of these contests are recommended by Reedsy. Winning Writers has also been named one of the "101 Best Websites for Writers" by Writer's Digest, most recently in 2025.

Contact:

Adam Cohen

413-320-1847

SOURCE Winning Writers