The Harper Lee Award for Alabama's Distinguished Writer of the Year is an annual award recognizing a writer who was born in Alabama or has spent their formative years there. It is named after Harper Lee, whose To Kill A Mockingbird has sold over 30 million copies.
The Harper Lee Award was established in 1998 and was first awarded to Albert Murray.
Recipients 1998 — Albert Murray 1999 — Madison Jones 2000 — Helen Norris 2001 — Sena Jeter Naslund 2002 — Mary Ward Brown 2003 — Rodney Jones 2004 — Sonia Sanchez 2005 — Andrew Highway 2006 — Wayne Greenhaw 2007 — William Cobb 2008 — Rebecca Gilman 2009 — Rick Bragg 2010 — Carolyn Haines 2011 — Winston Groom 2012 — Fannie Flagg 2013 — Gay Talese 2014 — Mark Childress 2015 — Hank Lazer 2016 — E. O. Wilson 2017 — Brad Watson 2018 — Honorée Fanonne Jeffers 2019 — Daniel Wallace 2020 — Patti Callahan Henry 2021 — Angela Johnson 2022 — Cynthia Tucker 2023 — Joy Harjo 2024 — Tom Franklin 2025 — Cassandra King
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