2025 – James – Percival Everett
2024 – Night Watch – Jayne Anne Phillips
2023 – Demon Copperhead – Barbara Kingsolver
2022 – The Netanyahus – Joshua Cohen
2021 – The Night Watchman – Louise Erdrich
2020 – The Nickel Boys – Colson Whitehead
2019 – The Overstory – Richard Powers
2018 – Less – Andrew Sean Greer
2017 – The Underground Railroad – Colson Whitehead
2016 – The Sympathizer – Viet Thanh Nguyen
2015 – All the Light We Cannot See – Anthony Doerr
2014 – The Goldfinch – Donna Tartt
2013 – The Orphan Master’s Son – Adam Johnson
2012 – No award
2011 – A Visit from the Goon Squad – Jennifer Egan
2010 – Tinkers – Paul Harding
2009 – Olive Kitteridge – Elizabeth Strout
2008 – The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao – Junot Díaz
2007 – The Road – Cormac McCarthy
2006 – March – Geraldine Brooks
2005 – Gilead – Marilynne Robinson
2004 – The Known World – Edward P. Jones
2003 – Middlesex – Jeffrey Eugenides
2002 – Empire Falls – Richard Russo
2001 – The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier & Clay – Michael Chabon
2000 – Interpreter of Maladies – Jhumpa Lahiri
1999 – The Hours – Michael Cunningham
1998 – American Pastoral – Philip Roth
1997 – Martin Dressler – Steven Millhauser
1996 – Independence Day – Richard Ford
1995 – The Stone Diaries – Carol Shields
1994 – The Shipping News – E. Annie Proulx
1993 – A Good Scent from a Strange Mountain – Robert Olen Butler
1992 – A Thousand Acres – Jane Smiley
1991 – Rabbit at Rest – John Updike
1990 – The Mambo Kings Play Songs of Love – Oscar Hijuelos
1989 – Breathing Lessons – Anne Tyler
1988 – Beloved – Toni Morrison
1987 – A Summons to Memphis – Peter Taylor
1986 – Lonesome Dove – Larry McMurtry
1985 – Foreign Affairs – Alison Lurie
1984 – Ironweed – William Kennedy
1983 – The Color Purple – Alice Walker
1982 – Rabbit Is Rich – John Updike
1981 – A Confederacy of Dunces – John Kennedy Toole
1980 – The Executioner’s Song – Norman Mailer
1979 – The Stories of John Cheever – John Cheever
1978 – Elbow Room – James Alan McPherson
1977 – No award
1976 – Humboldt’s Gift – Saul Bellow
1975 – The Killer Angels – Michael Shaara
1974 – No award
1973 – The Optimist’s Daughter – Eudora Welty
1972 – Angle of Repose – Wallace Stegner
1971 – No award
1970 – Collected Stories – Jean Stafford
1969 – House Made of Dawn – N. Scott Momaday
1968 – The Confessions of Nat Turner – William Styron
1967 – The Fixer – Bernard Malamud
1966 – Collected Stories – Katherine Anne Porter
1965 – The Keepers of the House – Shirley Ann Grau
1964 – No award
1963 – The Reivers – William Faulkner
1962 – The Edge of Sadness – Edwin O’Connor
1961 – To Kill a Mockingbird – Harper Lee
1960 – Advise and Consent – Allen Drury
1959 – The Travels of Jaimie McPheeters – Robert Lewis Taylor
1958 – A Death in the Family – James Agee
1957 – No award
1956 – Andersonville – MacKinlay Kantor
1955 – A Fable – William Faulkner
1954 – No award
1953 – The Old Man and the Sea – Ernest Hemingway
1952 – The Caine Mutiny – Herman Wouk
1951 – The Town – Conrad Richter
1950 – The Way West – A. B. Guthrie Jr.
1949 – Guard of Honor – James Gould Cozzens
1948 – Tales of the South Pacific – James A. Michener
1947 – All the King’s Men – Robert Penn Warren
1946 – No award
1945 – A Bell for Adano – John Hersey
1944 – Journey in the Dark – Martin Flavin
1943 – Dragon’s Teeth – Upton Sinclair
1942 – In This Our Life – Ellen Glasgow
1941 – No award
1940 – The Grapes of Wrath – John Steinbeck
1939 – The Yearling – Marjorie Kinnan Rawlings
1938 – The Late George Apley – John P. Marquand
1937 – Gone with the Wind – Margaret Mitchell
1936 – Honey in the Horn – H. L. Davis
1935 – Now in November – Josephine Winslow Johnson
1934 – Lamb in His Bosom – Caroline Miller
1933 – The Store – T. S. Stribling
1932 – The Good Earth – Pearl S. Buck
1931 – Years of Grace – Margaret Ayer Barnes
1930 – Laughing Boy – Oliver La Farge
1929 – Scarlet Sister Mary – Julia Peterkin
1928 – The Bridge of San Luis Rey – Thornton Wilder
1927 – Early Autumn – Louis Bromfield
1926 – Arrowsmith – Sinclair Lewis (declined)
1925 – So Big – Edna Ferber
1924 – The Able McLaughlins – Margaret Wilson
1923 – One of Ours – Willa Cather
1922 – Alice Adams – Booth Tarkington
1921 – The Age of Innocence – Edith Wharton
1919 – The Magnificent Ambersons – Booth Tarkington
1918 – His Family – Ernest Poole