Jesmyn Ward's SALVAGE THE BONES wins 2011 National Book Award

Jesmyn Ward's excellent novel, Salvage the Bones, took home this year's National Book Award for fiction.  Ward grew up and currently lives in DeLisle, Mississippi.  She was the 2010-2011 John and Renée Grisham Visiting Writer in Residence at the University of Mississippi.  She was also a Stegner Fellow at Stanford.  Her debut novel, Where the Line Bleeds, received many awards and excellent reviews. 
Watch Ward's acceptance speech below (she gives a shout out to Mississippi Indipendent bookstores):