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Biography

Lucille Clifton (1936 - 2010) was an award winning poet, fiction writer, and author of children’s books. Her poetry collection, Blessing the Boats: New & Selected Poems 1988-2000 (BOA, 2000), won the National Book Award for Poetry. In 1988 she became the only author to have two collections selected in the same year as finalists for the Pulitzer Prize, Good Woman: Poems and a Memoir (BOA, 1987), and Next: New Poems (BOA, 1987). In 1996, her collection The Terrible Stories (BOA, 1996), was a finalist for the National Book Award. Among her many other awards and accolades are the Ruth Lilly Poetry Prize, the Frost Medal, and an Emmy Award. In 2013, her posthumously published collection The Collected Poems of Lucille Clifton 1965-2010 (BOA, 2012), was awarded the Hurston/Wright Legacy Award for Poetry.

Books by Lucille Clifton

Authors · Featured

Michelle Phương Hồ

Michelle Phương Hồ is the author of Bone Symphony (Boa Editions, 2026), chosen by Aracelis Girmay as a Blessing the Boats Selection. Her work…

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Book Bundles · Featured

Boa Classic Book Bundle

With this one-time purchase you will receive a box of 5 best-selling titles from Boa with a few goodies from the publisher (broadsides, bookmarks,…

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Book Subscriptions · Featured

Boa Book Lovers Subscription

Subscribe and save on all forthcoming Boa titles within the calendar year! At the start of each season (every 6 months), subscribers will receive…

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Fiction · Featured

The Innocent Party

Winner of the Kurt Vonnegut Fiction Prize, Aimee Parkison’s characters struggle to understand what happens when the innocent party becomes the guilty party. With…

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New Release · Featured

I Am Trying to Love the Whole World

In her lyrical fifth collection, I Am Trying to Love the Whole World, Jenny Browne fearlessly holds grief without sentimentality and beauty without denial. For nearly…

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Nonfiction · Featured

The Complete Writings of Art Smith, the Bird Boy of Fort Wayne, Edited by Michael Martone

The Complete Writings of Art Smith, the Bird Boy of Fort Wayne, Edited by Michael Martone is a Midwestern mythology that celebrates facts, fiction,…

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Poetry · Featured

Against Distance

In Peter Makuck's Against Distance, nature is both a reprieve and a danger. Here, various landscapes—oceans, inlets, rivers, foothills, deserts—pressure and test human relationships. In…

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Rare and Signed · Featured

Sleeping with Houdini

Signed copies available in limited supply Nin Andrews starts from the premise that life on Earth is suffering, and that a large part of…

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Translations · Featured

Sea-Level Zero

In this ambitious collection, the first North American translation by one of Romania's most important writers, Daniela Crasnaru tackles such diverse subjects as the…

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