COUNCIL MEMBER YDANIS RODRIGUEZ COMMENDS AUTHOR JUNOT DIAZ FOR WINNING THE "RICHEST SHORT STORY AWARD IN THE WORLD"

The U.K. Newspaper, The Guardian, recently announced that prolific Dominican author Junot Diaz was awarded the Sunday Times EFG Private Bank Short Story Award, known as the richest short story award in the world. Diaz was presented with this award for his work on the short story, "Miss Lora", about a young teenage boy from New Jersey in the 1980's who has a sexual relationship with an older woman. This international award is granted to the best short story writers from around the world published in the UK.

In recognition of his fine work and to congratulate him on his latest award, Council Member Ydanis Rodriguez had this to say:

"I am happy and proud to see my good friend Junot win one of the top short story awards in the world. It speaks to the strides that Dominicans and Dominican-Americans have taken on an international scale as well as to the genius that Junot possesses. His work on a literary, academic and activist level has been exemplary and he is a leading voice for the Latino community both here in America and worldwide. Congratulations Junot!"

Diaz adds this latest award to his growing collection as he has already won the Pulitzer Prize for "The Brief and Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao", and was the recipient of a MacArthur "Genius" Grant following this work. His most recent book, a compilation of short stories titled, "This is How You Lose Her" was recently released in 2012 to great acclaim and was a finalist for the 2012 National Book of the Year Award.