1998 Peter Balakian, Black Dog of Fate (Basic)

1999 Ted Solotaroff, Truth Comes in Blows (Norton)

2000 Jeffery Smith, Where the Roots Reach for Water (North Point Press/Farrar, Straus & Giroux)

2001 C. K. Williams, Misgivings: My Mother, My Father, Myself (Farrar, Straus & Giroux)

2002 Marie Arana, American Chica (Dial)

2003 Rick Moody, The Black Veil (Little Brown)

2004 Anthony Swofford, Jarhead (Scribner)

2005 Nick Flynn, Another Bullshit Night in Suck City: A Memoir (W.W. Norton & Company)

2006 Gregory Rabassa, If This Be Treason: Translation and Its Dyscontents (New Directions)