Tinkers
This Monday, on April 12, the winners of the Pulitzer Prize were announced, and since then, little-known debut author Paul Harding has quickly risen to fame after his novel "Tinkers" won the Pulitzer for fiction.
The novel, about a dying man's recollection of and relationship with his father, a tinker in Maine, was turned down by every major publisher over the course of several years. It was finally published by Bellevue Literary Press, a small publisher associated with the NYU Medical School. Even after its publication and the excellent reviews across the board, few hoped for it to rise to the top. And when Harding was awarded the Pulitzer, the Boston Globe reports, he only found out by checking the award's website – nobody had bothered to call him. "Tinkers" is the first novel from a small press to win the Pulitzer since "Confederacy of Dunces" won in 1981 and everyone in the publishing industry is scrambling to take some part of the credit for the book's success.
The Boston Gl...
