BOSTON (AP) - Brando Skyhorse, author of "The Madonnas of Echo Park," is receiving the 2011 PEN/Hemingway Award for a distinguished first book of fiction.
Patrick Hemingway, writer Ernest Hemingway's sole surviving son, and writer Marilynne Robinson are presenting the California-based, Mexican-American writer with the award Sunday at the John F. Kennedy Presidential Library and Museum in Boston.
The award is given for "a novel or book of short stories by an American author who has not previously published a book of fiction."
Former PEN Hemingway Award winners - writers Joshua Ferris, Ha Jin and Robinson - talked Saturday about how their first novels affected their careers.
The John F. Kennedy Library is the major repository of Ernest Hemingway's works.