Friday, June 30, 2017

It's Book Award Season!


I am completely and utterly over the moon that our three novels swept the "Cover Design" category in the Indie Book Awards. THE MERMAIDS OF LAKE MICHIGAN by Suzanne Kamata with its gorgeous underwater illustration by Erika Craig WON BEST FICTION COVER! And TRIPLE LOVE SCORE by Brandi Granett and SECRETS OF WORRY DOLLS by Amy Impellizzeri were both Finalists. (Wow. Wow. Wow!)

 

UNWRITTEN by Lori Desautels and Michael McKnight was also a finalist in the "Education" category. Thrilled for them, this book could (and should) change education as we know it.

 

Amy’s SECRETS OF WORRY DOLLS also took home a SILVER WIN at ibpa’s 29th Benjamin Franklin Awards in "Cover Design" (again, this gives me an extra special fuzzy feeling since I landed in publishing by way of graphic design). This is our third Ben Franklin Award in 19 years (2000, 2007, 2017), so its especially fulfilling to get this prestige again. And our imprint Judy Scales-Trent took a SILVER WIN in "Biography"—see her other awards for this incredible book below.


Our favorite indie outlet, Foreword Reviews Book-of-the-Year INDIES, awarded SECRETS OF WORRY DOLLS a BRONZE Win in "Multicultural Fiction" (Woot!). And Judy's A BLACK MAN'S JOURNEY FROM SHARECROPPER TO COLLEGE PRESIDENT was a Finalist in the "Biography" category.


Crazy-excited that Suzanne's MERMAIDS won a SILVER IPPY in "Best Regional Fiction - Great Lakes" and our MATILDA, THE ALGONQUIN CAT by Leslie Martini and illustrated by Massi Mongiardo (his second win with Wyatt-MacKenzie!) won a BRONZE IPPY in "Children's Picture Books."


Another one of our favorites, National Indie Excellence Awards, gave UNWRITTEN a Finalist in "Education" and PIPER: ONCE & AGAIN shined in her meant-to-be category "Visionary Fiction."


Imprint BLUSH: WOMEN & WINE by Molly Davis WON in both "Women" and "Wine" (gotta love that!) and TUSCANY, our second travel guide with Matt Walker and Zeneba Bowers, WON in "Travel." Our sweet turtle-loving imprint STAY WHERE I CAN SEE YOU by Lori Samlin Miller garnered a Finalist in "Picture Books."

 

And finally, our impressive imprint Judy Scales-Trent and her grandfather's 1400 footnote (which almost destroyed our layout dept.) biography of her grandfather Won a Silver Nautilus Award.


Congrats to all! Every year thousands of books are entered in these competitions. I am honored and humbled to see our books and imprints always appear on finalists lists and still pinch myself when we WIN. One of my biggest joys is telling our authors to add "award-winning" to their taglines and bling to their covers.