INDIANAPOLIS — Six writers with Indiana ties have been named winners and finalists of the 2017 Eugene & Marilyn Glick Indiana Authors Award, a program of The Indianapolis Public Library Foundation funded through The Glick Fund, a fund of Central Indiana Community Foundation.
The winner of this year’s $10,000 National Author Award is children’s and young adult author Kekla Magoon, a former Ft. Wayne resident whose works include Rock and the River, How It Went Down, X: A Novel and the Robyn Hoodlum Adventures series. Magoon has received such awards as the NAACP Image Award, the John Steptoe New Talent Award and two Coretta Scott King Honors, and has been long listed for the National Book Award.
Thorntown, Indiana native Lori Rader-Day has been named winner of the $7,500 Regional Author Award. She is the author of The Day I Died, The Black Hour and Little Pretty Things and has received the 2016 Mary Higgins Clark Award and 2015 Anthony Award for Best First Novel.
The $6,000 award winner in Genre Excellence for Middle School Fiction is Indianapolis native John David Anderson, a critically-acclaimed author of several books for young people, including Ms. Bixby’s Last Day, a New York Times Editors’ Choice and an ALA Notable Book.
Emerging Author Award finalists are Bryan Furuness and Francesca Zappia of Indianapolis and Angela Palm of DeMotte, Indiana.
All winning authors and finalists will be honored at the ninth annual Indiana Authors Award Dinner on Saturday, October 14, 2017 at Central Library downtown. In addition to prize winnings, the winning authors will receive a $2,500 grant for the public library of his or her choice.
The public is invited to participate in the free “Meet the Author, Be an Author” event on October 14, which will include author talks and workshops led by the Indiana Writers Center and other guests for writers and booklovers of all ages.
For more information about the Indiana Authors Award and festivities, visit indianauthorsaward.org.
