The Chattahoochee Review and the Georgia Center for the Book have announced the finalists for the 2014 Townsend Prize for Fiction. The Townsend is presented biennially to a Georgia writer who has published an outstanding work of fiction the preceding two years.

The award ceremony will be Thursday, April 24, at 7 p.m. at the Atlanta Botanical Garden.

Keynote speaker for the event will be Jesmyn Ward, 2011 National Book Award winner and author of “Salvage the Bones,” and the new memoir, “The Men We Reaped.” Lee Walburn, former executive editor of Atlanta magazine, also will speak about the legacy of Jim Townsend.

The finalists are: “Accidents of Providence,” by Stacia Brown; “The Starboard Sea,” by Amber Dermont; “Someone Else’s Love Story,” by Joshilyn Jackson; “Where You Can Find Me,” by Sheri Joseph; “Pickett’s Charge,” by Charles McNair; “I Want to Show You More,” by Jamie Quatro; “A True History of the Captivation, Transport to Strange Lands & Deliverance of Hannah Guttentag,” by Josh Russell; “A Place at the Table;” by Susan Rebecca White; “Emerson’s Brother,” by Philip Lee Williams; and “God Carlos,” by Anthony Winkler.

Created in 1981, the prize was named for Jim Townsend, the founding editor of Atlanta magazine and an early mentor to Georgia writers Pat Conroy, Terry Kay, Bill Diehl and Anne Rivers Siddons. Previous winners of the Townsend include Kathryn Stockett for “The Help” and Alice Walker for “The Color Purple.” This is the 17th year of the award.

Tickets are $25 and include entry to the Atlanta Botanical Garden and heavy hors d'oeuvres. For tickets and information, go to gpc.edu/townsend. Georgia Perimeter College, the largest state college of the University System of Georgia, is the custodian of the Townsend Prize.