O. Henry Prize winners named

The 2026 O. Henry Prize for Short Fiction winners were announced on April 14, with novelist Tommy Orange serving as this year’s guest editor. (lithub.com) Orange selected 20 prizewinning stories from work published in magazines over the previous year, according to Literary Hub and Penguin Random House’s listing for the annual anthology. The book, edited by Orange and series-edited by Jenny Minton Quigley, is scheduled for publication on September 8, 2026. (lithub.com) (penguinrandomhouse.com) Literary Hub’s announcement framed Orange’s selections as stories that “take risks” and ask questions about community, family, friendship, life, and death. Quigley said the collection also follows the prize’s original 1919 aim of encouraging younger writers. (lithub.com) The O. Henry Prize is one of the oldest annual honors in American short fiction. Penguin Random House says the series was relaunched in 2021 under Quigley, with a guest editor choosing 20 stories for each volume. (penguinrandomhouse.com) That 2021 relaunch also widened eligibility: for the first time, stories in translation became eligible alongside work published in American and Canadian periodicals. The publisher said the change was meant to broaden the anthology’s reach beyond its earlier format. (penguinrandomhouse.com) This year’s volume continues that newer model, with Orange following recent guest editors including Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie and Amor Towles in shaping the annual selection. Quigley is the series editor for *The Best Short Stories of the Year: The O. Henry Prize Winners*. (penguinrandomhouse.com 1) (penguinrandomhouse.com 2) The anthology’s release is still months away, but the April announcement fixes the year’s O. Henry roster in place before the book arrives in September. For short-story writers and literary magazines, that list remains one of the field’s recurring markers of who gets carried into the next season. (penguinrandomhouse.com)