Ohioana Fiction Book Award: 2006
Michael Cunningham for Specimen Days
Farrar, Straus and Giroux
Michael Cunningham’s The Hours won the 1999 Pulitzer Prize and became an Oscar-winning movie. His fourth novel,
Specimen Days, borrows the same narrative pattern as The Hours
in that there are three interwoven stories that relate to a literary figure—in this instance, American poet Walt Whitman.
However, the book differs in that it draws heavily from the ghost story/thriller/science fiction genres.
Cunningham is formerly from Cincinnati and now divides his time between New York City and Providence, RI. He graduated with a B.A. from Stanford University and an
M.F.A. from the University of Iowa. In addition to the Pulitzer Prize, his honors include the Whiting Writer’s Award and fellowships from the
Guggenheim Foundation and the National Endowment for the Arts. He is currently at work on a screenplay of Lolly Winston’s novel, Good Grief.
Michael Cunningham website
| 
