In addition to the two prestigious USA Book Review Awards in late 2010, the past few weeks have been award frenetic for the first novel of the six book, Threads West, An American Saga series.
I am past stunned…yet another three national awards for Threads West-that makes SEVEN coveted 2010 AND 2011 awards across a spectrum of huge categories–Western, Romance, Historical Fiction, and Design. WOW! One in Western (BEST), THREE in Romance (one BEST and two Finalist), one in Historical Fiction (Finalist) and two in design (Finalist). All awards are highly competitive, but Romance may well be the toughest of all the fiction categories in which to gain recognition just due to the sheer volume of romance authors, works and submissions/nominations. Historical Fiction is not far behind in degree of difficulty. A quick summary:
BEST–Western–USA Book Review, Best Books 2010 Awards
Finalist–Romance–USA Book Review, Best Books 2010 Awards
BEST–Romance–Indies (Next Generation Indie Book Awards) 2011
Finalist–Design–Indies (Next Generation Indie Book Awards) 2011
Finalist–Historical Fiction–Ben Franklin Award- Independent Publishers Association 2011**
Finalist–Cover Design–Ben Franklin Award- Independent Publishers Association 2011**
Finalist–Romance–International Book Awards 2011
**Threads West is one of the three finalists in these–and Winner picked at awards banquet in NYC on May 23! We shall see 🙂
For more scoop:
The Benjamin Franklins (Independent Book Publishers Ass.) http://www.facebook.com/l/306adGk-nGRsYIDS8pvh7DgkkJQ/www.ibpa-online.org/pubressources/benfrank2011_finalist.aspx
The Indies 2011– www.IndieBookAwards.com
The International Book Ass. Best Book Awards 2011– http://www.internationalbookawards.com/2011awardannouncement.html
The USA Book Review 2010, Best Book Awards– http://www.usabooknews.com/bestbooks2010.html
So this is all quite startling, and very humbling. And while it most certainly imparts to a wide, dazed grin to my maw, it also sets an extremely high personal bar for book two, Maps of Fate, and the rest of the series. Then again, I always was partial to a good self-imposed challenge :-). And a big, big thanks to the great Threads West team who made it happen, from my terrific literary editor Page Lambert, eagle eye fourth printing copy (proof) editor, Jodie Renner, talented Art Director Jordan Allhands, Designer extraordinaire, Tamara Dever of TLC Graphics (and congrats on the new baby girl, Tami :-)), Rockin SR Publishing’s tireless Sr. Publishing Assistant, Kim Haight, Intermediary Distributor Narrow Gate Books, my erstwhile admin asst. Darlene Flinn, all the fine Independent, Barnes and Noble, Borders, and Hastings Book stores (see continually updated list at www.threadswestamericansaga.com), my terrific web master, Garlic Dzign, the nine Best Selling, #1 International Bestselling, #1 National Bestselling, and some Hollywood famous authors who have endorsed the book, my QL friends and mentors, and the over 1100 folks, reviewers, and bloggers who have posted or written four and five star reviews ! Yep a big heaping bucket of gratitude!
And–of course–a HUGE thanks to all my readers…you folks ROCK!