Books by celebrated authors from Trinidad & Tobago and Haiti have won the poetry, fiction, and nonfiction categories of the 2025 OCM Bocas Prize for Caribbean Literature (sponsored by One Caribbean Media Limited). These three books form the final shortlist for the overall prize, which will be announced on Saturday, May 3, during the 2025 Bocas Lit Fest. Our warmest congratulations for the winners!
The winners of the three genre categories are:
Poetry winner— Polkadot Wounds, by Anthony Vahni Capildeo (Carcanet)
Fiction winner— Village Weavers, by Miriam J.A. Chancy (Tin House)
Nonfiction winner— Salvage: Readings from the Wreck, by Dionne Brand (Knopf Canada/Farrar, Straus and Giroux)
Description (from Bocas Lit Fest): Now in its 15th year, the annual OCM Bocas Prize recognises the best books published by authors of Caribbean birth or citizenship, and is considered the region’s most distinguished literary award.
The three chairs of the genre panels — Alexis Pauline Gumbs (poetry), Denise deCaires Narain (fiction), and Rinaldo Scott (nonfiction) — now make up the final jury, joined by chief judge Erna Brodber, the celebrated Jamaican author whose many honours include a Windham-Campbell Prize for Fiction, a Musgrave Gold Medal from the Institute of Jamaica, and a Prince Claus Award.
The overall winner of the 2025 OCM Bocas Prize will be chosen from the three genre winners and awarded US$10,000. The other category winners will each receive US$3,000.
For more about the 2025 genre winners and to read what the judges had to say about each book, visit: https://bocaslitfest.com/awards/ocm/
[. . .] The Festival will run from Thursday 1 to Sunday 4 May, at the National Library and Old Fire Station and other venues around Port of Spain.
For more information, visit https://www.bocaslitfest.com/
Books by celebrated authors from Trinidad & Tobago and Haiti have won the poetry, fiction, and nonfiction categories of the 2025 OCM Bocas Prize for Caribbean Literature (sponsored by One Caribbean Media Limited). These three books form the final shortlist for the overall prize, which will be announced on Saturday, May 3, during the 2025
