O. Henry winners announced

The 2026 O. Henry Prize for Short Fiction winners were announced on April 14, with Tommy Orange serving as this year’s guest editor. (lithub.com) The annual O. Henry volume collects 20 prizewinning stories selected from work published over the previous year, and the 2026 anthology is scheduled for release on September 8, 2026. (lithub.com) (penguinrandomhouse.com) Series editor Jennifer Minton Quigley said Orange chose stories that “take risks and ask questions about the communities in which we live,” and the publisher says the book will include an introduction by Orange and notes from the winning writers. (lithub.com) (penguinrandomhouse.com) The prize is one of the oldest annual honors in American short fiction, and Penguin Random House says it has been awarded since 1919, with a break in 2020. (penguinrandomhouse.com) That long run gives the announcement weight beyond one book release: the O. Henry anthology remains one of the few yearly packages that can move magazine stories and online fiction into a wider commercial audience. (penguinrandomhouse.com 1) (penguinrandomhouse.com 2) Orange brings a high-profile name to that role. Literary Hub’s announcement identifies him as a MacArthur fellow, and Penguin Random House notes that his first novel, *There There*, was a finalist for the 2019 Pulitzer Prize. (lithub.com) (penguinrandomhouse.com) The prize has changed form over time. Penguin Random House says the current version publishes the selected stories in an annual Anchor Books anthology rather than ranking them as first-, second-, and third-place winners. (penguinrandomhouse.com) This year’s announcement also doubles as a publishing preview: the paperback edition is listed at 400 pages and $20.00 in the United States. (penguinrandomhouse.com) For readers, the next date is September 8, when the 2026 winners move from a Literary Hub list into the latest O. Henry anthology. (penguinrandomhouse.com)