Carnegie Medal 2019: Complete list of winners

The 2019 Carnegie Medal winners represent two strikingly different approaches to capturing the American experience—one through intimate fiction that spans decades, the other through searing memoir that refuses to look away. Rebecca Makkai’s The Great Believers claimed the fiction honor, a sweeping novel centered on a decades-long friendship between two men whose lives are irrevocably shaped by the AIDS crisis. Meanwhile, Kiese Laymon took the nonfiction award for Heavy: An American Memoir, a raw and unflinching exploration of family, race, body, and vulnerability that has sparked important conversations about what memoir can accomplish.

The Carnegie Medal, one of the most respected honors for American fiction and nonfiction, continues to recognize works that challenge readers while demonstrating exceptional literary craft. This year’s selections feel particularly timely—both books grapple with how individuals survive in the face of systemic forces, whether illness, racism, or family trauma. Makkai and Laymon represent the kind of contemporary writers the award has consistently championed: those willing to dig deep into difficult emotional terrain and emerge with something both personally urgent and universally resonant.

Here are the 2019 Carnegie Medal winners in full:

Fiction

• The Great Believers by Rebecca Makkai

Nonfiction

• Heavy: An American Memoir by Kiese Laymon