Patricia Lockwood wins $10,000 Gabe Hudson Prize for a dark, comic COVID-19 novel

Acclaimed author Patricia Lockwood has been awarded the $10,000 Gabe Hudson Prize for her novel "Will There Ever Be Another You." The prize, established in memory of the late author, educator, and editor Gabe Hudson, recognizes fiction that exhibits "humor, pathos, and a deep understanding of contemporary America."

The judges cited Lockwood's novel for its "sentences and passages [that] flash us with beauty or leave us reeling with laughter." They noted the book's exploration of pain without self-pity, highlighting "a marvelous self-awareness as to how ridiculous it is to be human."

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Sentences and passages flash us with beauty or leave us reeling with laughter. There is so much pain in the book and yet there is no self-pity, instead there is a marvelous self-awareness as to how ridiculous it is to be human.

"Will There Ever Be Another You" is described as a dark and comic novel that delves into a woman's breakdown amid the COVID-19 pandemic. Lockwood, known for her works "Priestdaddy" and "No One Is Talking About This," expressed a sense of kinship with Hudson, whom she never met. She described him as a "truly generous literary citizen" and a writer of "funny, gut-punching stories."

The Gabe Hudson Prize was established in 2024 by Hudson's mother, Sanchia Semere, and is administered by McSweeney's. Hudson, who passed away in 2023 at the age of 52, was celebrated for his fiction, his work as an editor at McSweeney's, and his teaching career at Yonsei University in Korea and other institutions.

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He was a truly generous literary citizen with a rich trajectory: a writer of funny, gut-punching stories, an inventive novelist, a cheerleader for others. He was a Marine, like my brother, and a teacher in South Korea, in the same neighborhood where my husband grew up.