Books on slavery and immigration among Lukas project winners

NEW YORK – Books about slavery, immigration and drug treatment are among this year’s winners of awards presented by the J. Anthony Lukas Project.

Jessica Goudeau’s “After the Last Border: Two Families and the Story of Refuge in America” won the Lukas Book Prize, a $10,000 honour for a socially or politically themed work which demonstrates “literary grace, commitment to serious research, and original reporting.”

The Mark Lynton History Prize, also worth $10,000, was given to William G. Thomas III for “A Question of Freedom: The Families Who Challenged Slavery from the Nation’s Founding to the Civil War.”

On Wednesday, the Lukas project also announced two work-in-progress awards, each with a $25,000 cash prize to help with the book’s completion: Emily Dufton, for “Addiction, Inc.: How the Corporate Takeover of America’s Treatment Industry Created a Profitable Epidemic” and Casey Parks, for “Diary Of a Misfit.”

The Lukas project, based at Columbia University, is named for the late investigative reporter and author. The awards were established in 1998 and have previously been given to Robert Caro, Isabel Wilkerson and Jill Lepore among others.