Six Bridges Book Festival: Porter Prize / Worthen Prize

Join us for the presentation of this year's Porter Fund Literary Prize to Jeffrey Condran and the Booker Worthen Literary Prize to Eli Cranor.

Porter Fund Literary Prize

The Porter Fund Literary Prize is presented annually to an Arkansas writer who has accomplished a substantial and impressive body of work that merits enhanced recognition.

The $5000 prize makes it one of the state's most lucrative as well as prestigious literary awards. Eligibility requires an Arkansas connection. This year’s recipient is author Jeffrey Condran. Jeffrey Condran is the author of the story collection, A Fingerprint Repeated (Press 53). His debut novel, Prague Summer (Counterpoint), received a 2015 Independent Publisher Book Award’s Silver Medal. His fiction has appeared in journals such as The Kenyon Review, The Missouri Review, and Epoch, and has been awarded the The Missouri Review’s 2010 William Peden Prize and Pushcart Prize nominations. He is an Assistant Professor of Creative Writing at the University of Arkansas at Little Rock and co-founder/publisher of the independent literary press, Braddock Avenue Books.

Booker Worthen Literary Prize

The Booker Worthen Literary Prize was established by the Central Arkansas Library System (CALS) in 1999 in memory of William Booker Worthen, a longtime supporter of the public library and a 22-year member of CALS Board of Trustees. The prize, which carries a $2,000 monetary award, is presented annually for the best work, fiction or non-fiction, by an author living in Arkansas and falling within the three-year eligibility period following publication. This year’s recipient is Eli Cranor. 

Bestselling novelist Eli Cranor lives on the banks of Lake Dardanelle and teaches creative writing at Arkansas Tech University. His work has been included on "best of the year" lists from the New York Times, USA Today, Amazon Editors, and others. His work has been nominated for nearly every major award in the crime fiction genre, and most recently the prestigious Mark Twain American Voice in Literature Award and the Willie Morris Award for Southern Writing in Fiction.  

CALS will validate parking in the CALS Library Square surface lot and the CALS Parking Deck. The entrance to the surface lot is located on 2nd Street near River Market Ave. The entrance to the parking deck is located on Rock Street and can be accessed from President Clinton Ave. Street parking is also available throughout the River Market District (free after 6pm and on weekends).