The Loft Literary Center has announced the winners of the McKnight Artist Fellowships. This year's $25,000 grants goes to four writers of creative prose, and to one writer for children. Out of 119 applications, the prose winners are:

Susanne Aspley, Shannon Gibney, Josh Ostergaard and Susan Power. The winner in children's literature is Kelly Barnhill.

Honorable mentions are Danielle Sosin, Nancy Scott Hanway, Tami Mohamed Brown, Eric Vrooman, Megan Atwood, Laura Salas and Lynne Jonell.

Aspley's debut novel, "Ladyboy and the Volunteer," was published in 2014. She lives in Excelsior.

Susan Power is a graduate of Harvard Law School and the Iowa Writers' Workshop. She is Yanktonia Dakota and the author of "The Grass Dancer" and "Sacred Wilderness."

Josh Ostergaard is the author of "The Devil's Snake Curve," published by Coffee House Press. His work has appeared in the New Yorker. He holds an MFA from the University of Minnesota and works for Graywolf Press.

Shannon Gibney lives in Minneapolis. She has a book forthcoming from Lerner Publications.

Kelly Barnhill is the author of a number of books for young people, including "The Witch's Boy" and "The Mostly True Story of Jack."