The prize for general non-fiction was awarded to Gilbert King for Devil in the Grove: Thurgood Marshall, the Groveland Boys and the Dawn of a New America, which details racial injustice in Florida in 1949.
The prize for poetry went to Native Guard by Natasha Trethewey and the general non-fiction award went to The Looming Tower, a best-selling investigation of the 11 September terrorist attacks on America by Lawrence Wright.