NEW YORK | Wed Mar 13, 2013 10:01pm EDT

NEW YORK (Reuters) - Author Claire Vaye Watkins won the annual Story Prize for short fiction on Wednesday for her collection of short stories that focus on the American West.

Watkins, an assistant professor at Pennsylvania's Bucknell University, won a $20,000 cash prize for "Battleborn," a series of 10 stories published by Riverhead Books that delve into the struggles of characters in both the historical and contemporary West.

With settings ranging from the gambling meccas of Reno and Las Vegas to rural brothels and Gold Rush towns, some of the stories are informed by Watkins' family notoriety - her father was a member of the Manson family and testified against Charles Manson at Manson's murder trial before dying of leukemia in 1990. The first story is entitled "Ghosts, Cowboys."

Watkins herself was born and raised in the unforgiving lands of the Mojave Desert, where she remains co-director of the Mojave School, a non-profit creative writing workshop for teenagers in rural Nevada.

The other finalists for the prestigious award, each of whom received $5,000, included Pulitzer Prize winner Junot Diaz for "This Is How You Lose Her," and National Book Award finalist ("Among the Missing") Dan Chaon for "Stay Awake."

The finalists, all of whom read excerpts and discussed their work on Wednesday at The New School, a university in Greenwich Village, were chosen from a list of 98 entrants.

In choosing Watkins, the judges cited the first-time author for "the audacity of her voice."

"In the 10 stories in her first collection, Claire Vaye Watkins takes an unflinching look at the apocalyptic dimensions of our culture's boom-or-bust obsession," they said in a joint statement.

"She's a fierce and original new writer, and 'Battleborn' is an astonishing short story collection," they added.

The judges were critic and author Jane Ciabattari, author and past Story Prize finalist Yiyun Li and New York City bookseller Sarah McNally.

Past winners of the annual prize have included Mary Gordon, Jim Shepard, Tobias Wolff and last year's winner, Steven Millhauser.

(Reporting by Chris Michaud; Editing by Jan Paschal)

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NEW YORK | Thu Feb 7, 2013 4:40pm EST

NEW YORK (Reuters) - Motown founder Berry Gordy Jr. watched with approval on Thursday as the cast of upcoming Broadway show "Motown: The Musical" tore through the storied record label's hits at a 42nd Street rehearsal studio.

The show traces Gordy's rise from a struggling boxer and autoworker to a music mogul who made stars of Smokey Robinson, Diana Ross, The Temptations, Stevie Wonder, Marvin Gaye, The Jackson 5 and others.

"So many other people were telling the story in different ways who were never there and never understood it, just for the sake of exploitation," Gordy, 83, a producer of the show, told Reuters.

The media preview featured hits ranging from The Contours' "Do You Love Me" - sung as a segregated audience in Birmingham, Alabama, breaks through a rope to hear the group - to "Dancing in the Street" by Martha and the Vandellas.

Director Charles Randolph-Wright, who grew up in South Carolina in the 1960s, said Motown was in his DNA.

"Motown opened the emotional door to the civil rights movement," he told Reuters. "Motown is the thing that brought people together. We started dancing to the same music and listening to the same music."

Gordy's relationship with Ross - the couple had a daughter together - is shown beginning in Paris, to the hit "My Girl" by The Temptations.

"That's the love story in our show," Randolph-Wright said.

The musical begins previews on March 11 and officially opens on April 14. It features a book by Gordy and music and lyrics from the Motown catalog.

Although the show is from Gordy's perspective, it doesn't duck some of the criticism that surrounded him, especially in Motown's early days, Randolph-Wright said.

As Gordy explained: "At one time, people were feeling that how could a black kid from Detroit do a Motown without being a crook, without being in the Mafia, without being something bad, because it was such a big endeavor."

Gordy, the creator of what was once the largest black-owned business in the United States, was an inspiration to him, Randolph-Wright said.

"Berry Gordy was someone who had his own company, who literally changed the world with what he did," he said. "And to see that, it gave me and so many people like me - black, white, whatever color - that gift of possibility."

Brandon Victor Dixon, who plays Gordy, said it was "hard to have a greater honor than having Berry Gordy respect you as an artist."

Valisia LeKae, who appeared in "The Book of Mormon," plays Ross. "It is the soundtrack of people's lives," LeKae said of the music. "I definitely expect people to sing along."

(Reporting By Noreen O'Donnell, editing by Jill Serjeant and Xavier Briand)

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