Tag: book awards

  • The 2024 Little Peeps Book Awards Hall of Fame for Children’s Books and Early Readers!

    Need a book for your Little Peep?

    a baby chick sitting in the grass with purple flowers.

    ***The CIBAs wants your Children’s Literature Today!***

    You have until September 30th to share your children’s story and enter the 2o24 CIBAs

    Two little chicks, fresh from their egg
    Enter Here

    The Little Peeps Book Awards features the best of the books that we read to our children and the young people who matter so much in our lives! Love of literature starts right away, and we’re proud to support these books for kids!

    Let’s Take a look at the Grand Prize Winners for the Little Peep Awards!

    The Girl Who Recycled 1 Million Cans
    By Shaziya M Jaffer, Brad Rudover and Jessica Alexanderson (Scrap University)
    Illustrated by Adam Trask

    The Girl Who Recycled 1 Million Cans, by Shaziya M. Jaffer, Brad W. Rudover, & Jessica Alexanderson, is perfectly written for children between three and eight years old.

    Eye-catching colorful graphics by Adam Trask, fun characters, and a wonderfully lighthearted storyline uphold this book’s message of protecting the environment. Both children and adults will feel empowered to help our planet one can at a time.

    An adventurous young girl named Ellie wants to buy a Unicorn. To earn the money she needs, Ellie plans to collect and recycle one million cans. But she soon realizes that her plans may need to take a different track. Together with her community of friends, who show great teamwork and perseverance, environmental lessons continue on with fantastic results.

    Read More Here

    Raven's Roost Cover

    Ravens Roost
    Written & Illustrated by Maggie Bates

    Maggie Bates’s Ravens Roost is a Children’s book that explores the illustrated nighttime adventures of a woman with her friend, a small frog.

    This story teaches children how to be curious about forest animals, even in the middle of a wind storm. Bates is new to writing Children’s books, and cares deeply for the natural world. Her rapport with animals likely inspired her debut tale.

    Ravens Roost begins with a frog sitting on a roof, wondering where ravens go at night. The woman who lives in the house decides to help the frog follow his curiosity on an adventure. First, she climbs up a tree to watch ravens soar overhead. She admires the moon and notices the birds perching in her favorite tree. She climbs down and starts her trek along a forest path as night falls and the wind picks up. The woman tucks her frog friend into her pocket for safety. Along their journey, the frog and the woman share a special friendship.

    Read More Here

    Victoria and the Big Brave Breath

    Victoria and The Big, Brave Breath
    By Andrea Vaughan
    Illustrated by Ryan Feltman

    Andrea Vaughan’s Victoria and the Big Brave Breath is a beautifully illustrated children’s book, written to ease conversations about anxiety and worry with a child.

    This story teaches children how to calm their nerves by focusing on their breath, using a clever onomatopoeia to help. Vaughn’s book is a timely must-read!

    Victoria and the Big, Brave Breath starts with a little girl named Victoria recognizing that she is often worried. She lists examples (trying new foods, going to the doctor, playing in the park) of her anxieties. Physically-speaking, Victoria’s hands sweat, her knees shake and her tummy hurts when her feelings appear. Her teddy bear best friend Baxter has a suggestion for her to ease these unfamiliar (and uncomfortable) feelings.

    Read More Here

    Great as a Button Cover

    Great as a Button
    By Masoud Malekyari
    Illustrated by Sebastiao Peixoto

    Masoud Malekyari’s Great As a Button is a delightful children’s book that places a soulful little plastic adornment at center stage in a thought-provoking story that offers up a positive lesson about self-worth.

    This tale unfolds from a first person POV as a lonely, black plastic button falls off a shirt. The button ruminates over its plight of feeling too plain to be noticed, and wishes perhaps to be a sock, a key, or a pair of glasses, i.e., a more important item that the button surmises someone would go out of their way to look for.

    Read More Here

    Galdo's Gift Cover

    Galdo’s Gift: The Boovie
    By Trevor Young and Eleanor Long

    In Galdo’s Gift: The Boovie, Eleanor Long & Trevor Young create an interactive animated story that helps children learn about their unique gifts through an imaginative tale and diverse vocabulary.

    The first page opens with a poem sharing a personalized gift with the reader. Then, we meet the frog King, and his kingdom Galdovia. His land is “where the wild wind whistles while the songbird sings” and he narrates the story, voiced by Brian Murphy.

    The townsfolk of Galdovia move on the page in textured illustrations. They need a hero to undertake an important adventure, with the promise of a gift from the King to whoever completes this quest. Enter four great heroes who start their journeys in the hope of earning the King’s reward.

    Read More Here

    The Tooth Collector Fairies: Home From Decay Valley Book 2
    By Denise Ditto
    Illustrated by Gabhor Utomo

    The need for good dental care and its effect on the tooth fairies working behind the scenes is colorfully highlighted in this action-packed book for children of all ages.

    Author Denise Ditto has created a delightful fantasy realm where fairies — like the prankster Jolene, the dedicated Batina, and proud, fast-flying Lucas — learn to collect and process teeth left for them by children everywhere. Jolene has finally gotten her Tooth Collector credentials and can join friends in their assignments. The story follows Batina into the messy room of a boy named Scooter, whose tooth shows signs of deplorable brushing habits. When she brings the tooth back to Brushelot for inspection, she fears the worst.

    Read More Here


    Now that you’re set on your next reads, what are you waiting for? The only way to join this amazing list of Hearten Winners is to submit today!

    The Chanticleer Int'l Book Awards Overall Grand Prize sticker for the CIBAs

    Those who submit and advance will have the chance to win the Overall Grand Prize of the CIBAs and $1000!

    Are you a Chanticleer Author who has some good news to share? Let us know! We’re always looking for a reason to crow about Chanticleerians! Reach out with your news to info@ChantiReviews.com

     

     

     

  • The 2024 M&M Hall of Fame for Cozy and Not-so-Cozy Mysteries!

    Curl up with a Cozy Mystery Today!

    Agatha Christie in front of the TARDIS, as played by Fenella Woolgar in the Dr Who episode The Unicorn and The Wasp.
    Agatha Christie in front of the TARDIS, as played by Fenella Woolgar in the Dr Who episode The Unicorn and The Wasp.

    Fall is the best time to enter the M&M Book Awards

    You have until September 30th to share your Novel with us and enter the 2024 CIBAs!

    Cozy Mystery Fiction Award

    This Division is dedicated to one of the most Well-known Mystery authors, Dame Agatha Christie. Poirot, Miss Marple, Tommy and Tuppence, and so much more.

    WWI Nurse, Writer, Playwright (and record holder of longest running Stage Play, The Mousetrap which opened in 1952), and Archaeologist, the latter of which contributed greatly to her novels.

    When she wasn’t busy writing, She spent quite a good amount of her life working on excavations in Egypt and Iraq with her 2nd Husband, archaeologist Max Mallowan.

    Agatha Christie (middle) with Max Mallowan and Leonard Woolley at the ruins of Ur in 1931

    But enough about Christie. The Hall of Fame features the Grand Prize Winners of the Mystery and Mayhem Award who we are proud to have in the Chanticleer Family!

    A Haunting at Linley: A Henrietta and Inspector Howard Novel
    By Michelle Cox

    In this seventh book of the series, Clive and Henrietta return to England to find Castle Linley in financial ruin. When Clive’s cousin, Wallace, invites an estate agent in to assess the home’s value, the agent is later found poisoned, throwing all of the Castle’s guests into suspicion. Clive and Henrietta are soon drawn into an investigation, which is slowed by an incompetent local inspector and several unexplained phenomena—the cause of which many, especially the frail Lady Linley, believe to be the workings of the ghost of a hanged maid.

    Meanwhile, Gunther and Elsie have begun life on a farm in Omaha. Circumstances are difficult, but they are content—until Oldrich Exely appears, proposing an option Elsie finds difficult to ignore. Melody Merriweather, still masquerading as a nun to aid Elsie’s escape, likewise finds it difficult to ignore a letter with tragic news from home, while Julia, on the other hand, receives a very different sort of letter from Glenn Forbes.

    Back in England, Clive is called away to London on suspicious business, leaving Henrietta to carry on with the investigation alone. When she is mysteriously locked in the study one night, however, things take on a more deadly, supernatural feel, leaving her to fear that Lady Linley’s “ghost” might just be real after all…

    Order it today!

    A Spying Eye Cover

    A Spying Eye: A Henrietta and Inspector Howard Novel
    By Michelle Cox

    Brooding Château du Freudeneck, just outside Strasbourg, France has villains in the drawing rooms, stolen art hidden in the cellars, and bats in the belfry – all the best elements for a 19th-century Gothic mystery.

    However, in Michelle Cox’s novel, A Spying Eye it’s the 20th century. The Great War is passed, but the next war already looms on the horizon. The people of Strasbourg feel the growing conflict sharply, at the heart of Alsace-Lorraine, a fertile region that has been contested between France and Germany since time immemorial.

    Which means those bats are in the unfortunate head of the elderly Baron Von Harmon, the current lord and master (as much as he’s still able to be, at least) of the Chateau, while the stolen art is pursued by both the villainous Nazis and the only slightly-less villainous agents of Britain’s MI5.

    Read More Here

    Ophelia's Room Cover

    Ophelia’s Room
    By Michael Scott Garvin

    Ophelia’s Room by Michael Scott Garvin begins with a bang – and a child’s whimper.

    A frantic, distraught father pounds on a bolted chapel door in a small country hospital…. A tiny, two-day-old infant cries in peril….  A deranged grandfather sees demons in every shadowy corner.

    The opening scene read like something out of a young parent’s nightmare. Will their child be healthy? Will they grow up to be successful? Will the child be safe in their grandparents’ arms?  Questions that any new mother and father ask themselves. In Garvin’s Ophelia’s Room, the answers are terrifying.

    Read More Here

    The Discovery Book Cover Image

    The Discovery
    By Patrick M. Garry

    Patrick M. Garry’s The Discovery encompasses a narrative that traverses a family legal case jigsaw puzzle toward a discovery of self by exploring the ghost of ancient regrets, basic human desires, and questions of faith.

    Frank Horgan, a former lawyer at one of Minneapolis’ largest firms, now practices small-case litigation in the little community of Basswood Hills. Frank, a victim of his own follies, has one more chance to restore his career to its former glory. But not before a huge legal matter comes knocking on his door at his father’s diner. This case kicks off the legal drama, bringing in several main and secondary characters to play their parts in the ultimate discovery of buried contentedness and eventually a scandal that breaks into the national newspaper.

    Meanwhile, Frank comes upon the case of the most prominent McCorkle family in Basswood Hills.

    Read More Here

    Dharma, A Rekha Rao Mystery
    By Vee Kumari

    A complex murder mystery always requires a little spice. In Dharma, A Rekha Rao Mystery, that extra seasoning is provided by the casting of an Indian American woman as the amateur sleuth, despite her realistic fears for her personal safety.

    Professor Rekha Rao is no Bollywood Mighty Girl. She’s a whip-smart American-born 32-year-old college instructor who must deal with her own PTSD after the murder of her father and her unstoppable passion for releasing the man wrongly convicted of her father’s slaying. That obsession is the reason Rekha was dismissed from her old teaching position. The scene is set for deep, personal involvement in the murder of a colleague, a fellow professor who is killed. And a rare, centuries-old statue excavated from an archeological dig in India is the murder weapon.

    Read More Here

    A Promise Given
    By Michelle Cox

    With a much-anticipated wedding is in the works, but family complications and entanglements threaten the celebration, when is love A Promise Given, and when is it a compromise taken?

    Amidst tribulations of friends and family, the smart and beautiful Henrietta, and the intense Inspector Clive Howard say, “I do.” Now the loving couple will learn how to be Mr. and Mrs. Howard on their honeymoon in England with his relatives at Castle Linley, where intrigue and mystery await their arrival.

    Read More Here


    Now that you’re set on your next reads, what are you waiting for? The only way to join this amazing list of Hearten Winners is to Enter Today!

    The Chanticleer Int'l Book Awards Overall Grand Prize sticker for the CIBAs

    Those who submit and advance will have the chance to win the Overall Grand Prize of the CIBAs and $1000!

    You know you want it…

    Are you a Chanticleer Author who has some good news to share? Let us know! We’re always looking for a reason to crow about Chanticleerians! Reach out with your news to info@ChantiReviews.com

  • The 2024 Chaucer Hall of Fame for Early Historical Fiction

    Looking for a sense of History?

    Trinity college library, Dublin

    Look no further! The Chaucer Awards are here to bring stories from anytime before 1750.

    You have until September 30th to submit your story and enter the 2024 CIBAs!

    The Chaucer Awards for Historical Novels

    Named for Geoffrey Chaucer, author of the Canterbury Tales (and Name giver of a certain rooster named Chanticleer), This Division was our first Historical Fiction category.

    Not much belonging to the author in question still survives. Although in 2023, a document in the British National Archive was determined to be written in his own hand. The document dates from Chaucer’s 12-year stint as the controller of the London Wool Quay, and is a note asking King Richard II for time off of work. Read more about that in this article from the Guardian

    The note, written by Geoffrey Chaucer, spelled Geffray Chaucer in the text, rediscovered in the British National Archives

    The Most famous thing associated with him though, has to be Poets Corner of Westminster Abbey. The corner dedicates memorials to some of the best of British writers. Poets corner is centered around the Tomb of Geoffrey Chaucer himself, which was erected in 1559, as his actual burial is known to be somewhere in the area, but is unmarked. Writers such as Charles Dickens, Rudyard Kipling, Alfred Lord Tennyson, and more are buried or have memorials surrounding Chaucer’s.

    Poets Corner in Westminster Abbey

    In this years Chaucer Award posts, we are also highlighting some of the often overlooked female writers of the past. This time, Christine De Pisan. Writing in the early 1400s, she was rather prolific in her work. Poetry, Novels, Biographies and more, including the only French-language work about Joan of Arc written in her lifetime. Christine is the first known women to actually make a living on her own writing.

    Christine De Pisan from Harley MS 4431, held in the British Library.

    The fact she was able to support herself and her children off of her writing in this era is remarkable. Her most well known work, The Book of the City of Ladies and its sequel The Treasure of the City of Ladies, written in about 1405, collecting biblical, mythological and historical female figures together, and using them as the ‘building blocks’ for a theoretical idealized city as a commentary on the world she lived in. Her book argues that women actually had a valued place and meaning in society and should be educated the same as men were. Her biography of Joan of Arc in 1429, is her last known piece of writing, as she disappears from written history after that.

    And with that, Lets Take a look back in more recent history at the Grand Prize Winners of the Chaucer Award!

    The Merchant From Sepharad
    By James Hutson-Wiley

    Joshua Ibn Elazar, the eager son of a Jewish merchant, travels to al-Andalus (the Iberian Peninsula under Muslim rule) to prove himself in his father’s business. But he finds an unwelcoming, degrading society waiting for him, and begins a journey of misfortune and anger in James Hutson-Wiley’s historical fiction novel, The Merchant from Sepharad.

    Shortly after arriving in the city of Lishbunah, al-Andalus, Joshua is tricked out of the gold for his living expenses. Worse yet, he learns that Jews in Lishbunah suffer under oppressive laws, holding far less status than Muslim citizens. He can only find help in Lishbuna’s Jewish community, meeting Rabbi Hiyya al-Daudi and his son Yaish, who house and feed him.

    They tell him that his father’s colleague, Essua, who was to help Joshua manage a shipment of flax and sugar, has been arrested. Though Essua is eventually released, Joshua fails to secure storage for his goods, as the makhzan (warehouse) he rented is given to a Muslim merchant instead. In his fury at the city’s prejudice, he sets fire to the makhzan, and is forced to flee.

    Read More Here!

    Daughter of Hades Cover

    Daughter of Hades
    By Mack Little

    Mack Little’s historical fiction novel Daughter of Hades explores the lives of slaves during the age of pirates.

    Little’s research shines in her thoughtful presentation of the Caribbean islands, the escaped slaves who found freedom amongst them, the lives of buccaneers and maroons, and their daring and dangerous exploits.

    On the first page, Little introduces us to Geraldine, or “Dinny”, running for her life from her owner, Owen Craig, who has just raped her.

    Dinny’s father had arranged for her to be removed from the plantation before Craig molested her, but he’d miscalculated Craig’s lust. Dinny is rescued by her twin brother, Jimmie, and Leixiang, and taken to the Hades, a pirate ship captained by the buccaneer Duff.

    Read More Here

    Too Soon the Night Cover

    Too Soon The Night
    By James Conroyd Martin

    Too Soon the Night by James Conroyd Martin shows the thrilling heights to which Empress Theodora rose and the crushing depths to which she fell, in the latter half of her life. This story picks up from Fortune’s Child, the first volume of this epic duology.

    This half of Theodora’s incredible journey opens at its close – as she succumbs to the cancer that drove her to dictate the record of her life. She left the task of recording her meteoric rise from actress to empress in the hands of the scribe and historian Stephen, even though she imprisoned him for several years out of fear that he would reveal her greatest secrets.

    Read More Here

    Cover of Bird in a Snare by N.L. Holmes

    Bird in a Snare
    By N.L. Holmes

    Politics is a deadly game in the days of Kings and their competing 14th-century B.C. Egyptian factions. Official diplomat, Lord Hani, is on a royal assignment when he discovers even the king’s motives are suspect. Hani begins to fear for the welfare of his family and himself, as he gets a sinking feeling that the hunter has become the hunted. He’s the live bait, the Bird In A Snare.

    Can Lord Hani find out who is responsible for the mysterious assassinations and the shifting armies’ alliances before becoming the one they target next?

    Read More Here

    Fortunes Child
    By James Conroyd Martin
    2019 Overall Grand Prize Winner

    James Conroyd Martin brings to life one woman we should all know better in his multi-award-winning, epic novel, Fortune’s Child: A Novel of Empress Theodora.

    Like Cleopatra, Empress Theodora was a legend in her own time. And also, like Queen Cleopatra before her, Empress Theodora’s life and accomplishments were distorted and maligned by the male historians of her own time. Even after death, men who couldn’t bear or couldn’t believe that a woman, particularly a woman of the lower classes as Theodora was, could possibly have accomplished the things she did or wield the power she had.

    Fortune’s Child, the first book of a projected duology, Theodora, near death, determines to leave behind an accurate chronicle of her life and work. She’s desperate to get a step ahead of the official biography already being written by a man who hates her, everything she came from, and everything she stands for.

    Read More Here

    The Serpent and The Eagle
    By Edward Rickford

    In The Serpent and the Eagle, Edward Rickford details Hernan Cortes’ 1519 expedition to explore and secure the interior of Mexico for colonization, fleshing out known facts with the human factor—it is, to the typical depiction of Cortes’ exploration of the Yucatán peninsula, what a chorus is to a solo or a tulip to a bulb. Primarily narrated by individuals who were actual members, or may have been members, of this expedition, Rickford has crafted a fascinating tale of intrigue, love, lust, greed—essentially all seven of the deadly sins—within two diametrically opposed political and cultural systems.

    Read More Here


    Now that you’re set on your next reads, what are you waiting for? The only way to join this amazing list of Chaucer Winners is to submit today!

    The Chanticleer Int'l Book Awards Overall Grand Prize sticker for the CIBAs

    Those who submit and advance will have the chance to win the Overall Grand Prize of the CIBAs and $1000!

    Are you a Chanticleer Author who has some good news to share? Let us know! We’re always looking for a reason to crow about Chanticleerians! Reach out with your news to info@ChantiReviews.com

  • The 2024 Clue Book Awards Hall of Fame For Suspense/Thriller!

    Who’s at the door at this late hour?

    Clue Awards for Suspense Thriller Novels

    It’s the Clue Awards closing at the end of September!

    The Clue Awards features the best suspense and thriller books, including both fiction and true crime! We are delighted to feature these amazing authors from the last five years of Clue Grand Prize Awards!

    Here is the official  Hall of Fame for the Grand Prize Winners of the Clue Awards!

    The Other Murder Cover

    The Other Murder
    by Kevin G. Chapman

    In The Other Murder by Kevin G. Chapman, two ambitious journalists find themselves at the knife’s edge as they seek to uncover the entire truth of a gruesome double homicide.

    “An error does not become truth because of multiplied propaganda, nor does truth become error because nobody sees it.” –Mahatma Gandhi

    Hannah, a journalist with the American Cable News network, is pulled away from a date by her editor to cover the breaking news of a shooting in Washington Square Park. The victim is Angelica Monroe, a White girl from Westchester County and a sophomore at NYU. She was shot at a close range, as shown by the dark hole above her left eye.

    The murder becomes much more mysterious and complicated when Paulo, a reporter for a small community newspaper, makes a connection between Angelica’s murder and the shooting of a Latino teen, Javier Estrada, on the other side of the park on the same night.

    Read More Here

    The Vines
    By Shelley Nolden

    Shelley Nolden’s debut novel, The Vines, embraces multiple genres as it chills, fascinates, and horrifies, from historical and magical realism to fantasy and horror.

    Nolden has melded fanaticism, medical anomalies, and the frailties of human behavior together with a historic setting, creating a narrative Kudzu vine that grows rapidly and spares nothing in its path. This particular vine consists of two main branches that intertwine, bridging time and linking parallel realities, one past, one present.

    The Gettler men of Long Island, New York have shepherded a secret medical research project for generations, with the exception of Finn, the youngest man in the family.

    Read More Here

     

    A Venomous Love
    By Chris Karlsen

    Detective Rudyard Bloodstone is facing the most bizarre crime spree of his career as a copper on the Victorian streets of London. Someone is using a poisonous Cape cobra as a weapon.

    What begins as a simple robbery scheme turns deadly when a wealthy businessman is killed via cobra attack, the crimes go from strange to deadly. Rudyard (Ruddy) and his partner, Archie Holcomb, have few clues and no idea what would cause such a change in the criminal’s behavior.

    When the criminal returns to the estate and attacks the victim’s daughter, Ruddy’s suspicions are confirmed.

    Read More Here

     

    Salvaging Truth
    By Joanne Jaytanie

    Famed marine biologist and researcher Claudia Rawlings is presumed dead. When Claudia’s research vessel goes down, her daughter Riley goes on a desperate search to discover what happened, eventually turning to Dagger Eastin, co-owner of Hunters and Seekers a marine salvage business. Dagger soon realize this isn’t a simple search and reclaim mission when someone takes a shot at him during an exploratory dive with Riley.

    Former Navy SEALs, Dagger, and his partners Kaleb LaSalle and Stone Garrison are the definitions of relentless, and they quickly become embroiled in the investigation that has caught the attention of some very influential people, all seeking Claudia’s important research. And while Riley learns that her mother has left behind clues to her missing research, the Hunters and Seekers pull out all the stops to help and protect her. The wild scavenger hunt sends Dagger and Riley on a trip to discover the truth, but Russian spies, big oil cronies, and psychopathic hitmen lurk around every corner.

    Read More Here

    California Son
    By Timothy Burgess

    California Son, the second installment in the Liam Sol Mystery series by Timothy Burgess, presents another action-packed mystery for protagonist Liam Sol to solve. Honorably discharged after his tour of duty in Vietnam, Liam returns to his primarily Hispanic neighborhood of Baja La Bolsa, a coastal town near LA, California, where trouble finds him.

    In his role as a journalist, Liam takes interest in the daily pleas of a Hispanic mother to find her son’s murderer, pleas that the mostly white La Bolsa Police seem to ignore. After an article he writes in hopes of renewing interest in the case appears in La Bolsa Tribune, the mother is found dead in her apartment. No stranger to death or violence, Liam soon finds himself on the personal side of a hunt for the killer of not only the son but also the mother.

    Read More Here


    Now that you’re set on your next reads, what are you waiting for? The only way to join this amazing list of Clue Winners is to Enter Today!

     

    Those who submit and advance will have the chance to win the Overall Grand Prize of the CIBAs and $1000!

    Are you a Chanticleer Author who has some good news to share? Let us know! We’re always looking for a reason to crow about Chanticleerians! Reach out with your news to info@ChantiReviews.com

  • The 2024 Hearten Book Awards Hall of Fame for Uplifting and Inspiring Non-Fiction

    Take a deep breathe and smile

    A book covered in flower petals with the pages formed into a heart

    The Hearten Awards are here to bring you joy, and maybe a few tears with some of these excellent books

    **Your Story is Worth Sharing**

    You have until September 30th to share your uplifting memoir with us and enter the 2024 CIBAs!

    Enter by September 30, 2024

    Uplifting and heartwarming work is a vanishingly rare thing these days, and we love having an Awards Division that can inspire readers and writers alike. The Hearten Awards seeks true stories about adventures, life events, unique experiences, travel, personal journeys, global enlightenment, and more.

    Join us in celebrating the Hall of Fame for Grand Prize Winners of the Hearten Awards

    Running Away from the Circus Cover

    Running Away From the Circus
    By Nove Meyers

    Debut author Nove Meyers breathes life into the big tent of human aspirations and desperations, from his birth into a raucous circus atmosphere to his diligent study for Catholic priesthood.

    Running Away from the Circus is a vibrant chronicle that opens with a vignette of his grandmother, clad in sequins and flying on a trapeze. She spun like a top to enthusiastic applause under the circus tent, until the fateful day when she included her young child in the act, dropping her thirty feet to the sawdust-covered floor below. But this did not prevent Nove Meyers from being born and having a story to tell.

    The boyhood described was as wild as the circus acts. He was encouraged to smoke cigarettes like his father and watched in astonishment as his mother burned up paper money, possibly to protect his uncle, a counterfeiter. Yet despite his unusual upbringing as one of the family’s third generation of circus owners, Meyers was taken regularly to Catholic church services. There, he discovered God, an entity as mysterious as the traveling circus and carnie crowds he was raised among.

    Read more here!

    Inner Trek Cover

    INNER TREK – a reluctant pilgrim to the Himalayas
    By Mohan Ranga Rao

    A disinclined traveler journeys into the heartland of the revered Mount Kalash Parikarma in Tibet. Inner Trek by Mohan Ranga Rao follows a voyage that culminates in self-discovery and spiritual enlightenment.

    Mohan Ranga Rao, a retired Indian businessman, finds himself between a rock and a hard place when a ruthless Bangalore mob boss threatens him to sell his land at a throwaway price. The situation escalates when he discovers that his trusted lawyer has joined forces with the enemy. He can only turn to his wife for solace.

    With nothing for him to do about his land, Rao vows to trek around Mount Kailash, a holy Tibetan Mountain. This travel memoir traces his and his wife’s journey to the deified Himalayas, the land of Lord Shiva. Rao shares intimate details of his experience, including the spiritual transformation that he went through during his challenging high-altitude trek.

    Read more here!

    DAWGS Cover

    DAWGS: A True Story of Lost Animals and the Kids Who Rescued Them
    by Diane Trull & Meredith Wargo

    We love our dogs. We love our cats. But what do we do when people no longer want them, use them for cruel purposes, or release them into the streets with no thought for what will happen to them? Diane Trull’s memoir with Meredith Wargo, DAWGS, shines a light on these questions.

    Trull begins the story as a fourth-grade teacher in Dalhart, Texas. One of her young students asks about an article in a local paper showing photos of adorable dogs at a shelter who were up for adoption, wondering what happened to those who weren’t adopted.

    Instead of dodging the question, and with great trepidation, she answered it with the truth: those who weren’t adopted would be put to sleep. Her tiny students were understandably shocked. Then one of them said, “I don’t want any of those dogs to die. Isn’t there something we can do to save them?”

    Read more here!

    Love Life & Lucille Cover

    Love, Life, and Lucille
    By Judy Gaman

    Award-winning author, motivational speaker, and podcast host Judy Gaman befriends a fun-loving and feisty centenarian in her CIBA Grand Prize-winning novel, Love, Life, and Lucille.

    The list of titles and accolades Judy Gaman has accrued begin to pale when she encounters Lucille Fleming for the very first time. The whole reason for the meet-up with the centenarian was specifically to get her opinions on “aging gracefully,” the featured topic of a new book Judy planned to write. What was scheduled as an hour-long interview turned into an absolutely delightful, near three-hour visit. Lucille turned the tables and began asking questions about Judy’s life with compelling earnestness—something Judy rarely experienced. She was unprepared yet exhilarated.

    Judy couldn’t stop thinking about this “dressed to the nines” woman with an ear-to-ear smile and a sturdy, affectionate hug. Her contact with this larger-than-life woman was so infectious, Judy made up an excuse—so that she could see her again. During that second meeting, the two became fast friends as they set Fridays aside as their day to get together. Before their next planned meeting, Judy learned that Lucille had gone into cardiac arrest. She was dead for three minutes before she came back full of vim and vigor as if nothing had happened. Five months later, Lucille was more than ready for TV interviews. With that, Judy made plans to write a second book about Lucille and their relationship.

    Read more here!


    Now that you’re set on your next reads, what are you waiting for? The only way to join this amazing list of Hearten Winners is to enter today!

    The Chanticleer Int'l Book Awards Overall Grand Prize sticker for the CIBAs

    Those who submit and advance will have the chance to win the Overall Grand Prize of the CIBAs and $1000!

    The Blue and Gold Best Book Awards for the CIBAs
    You know you want it…

    Are you a Chanticleer Author who has some good news to share? Let us know! We’re always looking for a reason to crow about Chanticleerians! Reach out with your news to info@ChantiReviews.com

     

  • The Laramie 2024 Hall of Fame for Americana Fiction!

    The Frontier is calling

    Submit your Americana, Western or Civil War Novels to the CIBAs!

    western themed porch with a barrel, bottles, and a hat and banjo on a chair***Tell your story today***

    You have until September 30th to share your Story with us and enter the 2024 Laramie Division of the CIBAs!

    Laramie Awards for Western Pioneeer Civil War Fiction Award

    Charles M. Russell painted the cowboy seen on Chanticleer’s very own Laramie contest badge. It is one of many such paintings he did that encompassed the Old American Wild West. An advocate for the Native Americans, Charles M. Russell also helped establish a reservation in Montana for the Chippewa people.

    Our Laramie Hall of Fame Celebrates the Grand Prize Winners of now and past years!

    The Last Man: A Novel of the 1927 Santa Claus Bank Robbery
    By Thomas Goodman

    In The Last Man: A Novel of the 1927 Santa Claus Bank Robbery by Thomas Goodman, four men in a small, depression-era Texas town lay in wait to carry out their unique plan for a holiday heist.

    It’s December 23 and a man in a Santa Claus suit walks into a bank. But rather than his bag full of Christmas surprises, he’s brought a gun. With the element of surprise on their side, the robber and his two partners would collect the cash, while another partner waited in the getaway car. It all seemed so simple.

    At the time, Texas bankers—in order to deter crimes such as this—promised a $5,000 reward for any dead bandits, “and not one cent” for the capture of a live one. Should anything go wrong, the possibilities for disaster were clear as a Greek tragedy. but what could go wrong?

    Full review to come! Buy the book here!

    Guarded Hearts Cover

    Guarded Hearts
    By T.K. Conklin

    Guarded Hearts by T K Conklin is a sensual romance in the Wild West, with all the passion and excitement natural to the setting.

    Sparks fly between a man with an outlaw past and a woman with a terrifying gift to heal or harm. Strykes is a man haunted both by a violent childhood and his time in an outlaw gang. But he has found a place in Rimrock, where he met LaRisa, an auburn-haired woman whom the townspeople have labeled a “witch” due to her healing herbs and rumors of her “powers”.

    LaRisa has kept her distance from people, afraid of her gift of healing touch that can turn dangerous, even deadly. But, when she comes to town to deliver her medicinal herbs, she makes her way to the livery with tasks for Strykes such as shoeing her horse or fixing a spring in her wagon. He is only too happy to oblige the auburn-haired beauty. The attraction between them is instantaneous, yet they both are hesitant to act on it, fearing they would hurt the other– he from his violent past, and she from her “witch” power.

    Read More Here

    Tom Sawyer Returns
    By E.E. Burke

    Tom Sawyer Returns is the second book in The New Adventures series by author E.E. Burke.

    Readers join a now grown up and far more independent Becky Thatcher as she maneuvers her complicated life in Civil War era Mississippi. Tom has long since left, and Becky is engaged to Union Captain Alfred Temple, who offers her all the safety and security she needs in such uncertain times. But does she love him? Actually love him?

    Becky soon discovers that her heart may have other plans.

    Read More Here

    Cover of Trouble The Water by Rebecca Dwight Bruff

    Trouble The Water
    By Rebecca Dwight Bruff
    Overall Grand Prize Winner

    Robert Smalls’ life should have been one for the history books.

    Smalls was born a slave in Beaufort, South Carolina, in 1839. When the first shots of the Civil War were fired upon Fort Sumter, Smalls was an experienced helmsman aboard a small cargo ship plying the coastal waters of South Carolina and the neighboring states. Once the war broke out, he found himself working to support a cause that kept him, his wife, and their children locked in chattel slavery.

    But in a daring escapade that fell somewhere between a raid and a rescue, Smalls planned, with the help of his fellow crew members (also slaves) aboard the CSS Planter, to abscond with the ship, its cargo of munitions taken from Fort Sumter, and bring their families. The plan was to sail the ship as though its white officers were still on board, pretending to be carrying out their orders—at least until the ship was out of the reach of Fort Sumter’s guns.

    Read More Here

    Seven Aprils
    By Eileen Charbonneau

    Disguised gender identities, warfare, and thwarted romance all play a role in this many-layered novel, Seven Aprils, by award-winning fiction author Eileen Charbonneau.

    When Tess Barton, a hardscrabble farm girl, saves the life of a man attacked by a panther, she and he little realize how fated this encounter will prove. Ryder Cole, the man she saved, moves on, pursuing a medical career just as the United States seems destined for war. Intrepid Tess will move on, too, when she learns that her widower father sells her in matrimony to an old, brutish shopkeeper. A wise crone cuts Tess’s hair and garbs her in men’s attire. Reborn as Tom Boyde, who will soon, strangely, meet up with Ryder and become one of his “men,” conscripted into Lincoln’s armies. Tess/Tom shows promise as a medical assistant with some undeniable cooking skills, and together with two other conscripts, they make the team in the Union’s army hospital units.

    Read More Here

    Blood Moon A Captives Tale
    By Ruth Hull Chatlien

    Ruth Hull Chatlien’s historical novel Blood Moon: A Captive’s Tale shines a light on two worlds trying to coexist in the 1860s Minnesota, that of Westward Expansion and white settlers, and that of the complex network of Sioux tribes dealing with starvation and disease. We follow her protagonist, Mrs. Sarah Wakefield, as she is thrust unwillingly into the midst of the Indian Wars.

    Based loosely on the life of real captive, Sarah Wakefield, Chatlien explores both sides of this conflict, through the eyes of our terrified hero, who does what she must to save her life and the lives of her two small children. The first-person narrative in present tense places us in the thick of Wakefield’s narrow escapes, and the presence of the constant threats to her and her children.

    Read More Here


    Now that you’re set on your next reads, what are you waiting for? The only way to join this amazing list of Laramie Winners is to submit today!

    The Chanticleer Int'l Book Awards Overall Grand Prize sticker for the CIBAs

    Those who submit and advance will have the chance to win the Overall Grand Prize of the CIBAs and $1000!

    Are you a Chanticleer Author who has some good news to share? Let us know! We’re always looking for a reason to crow about Chanticleerians! Reach out with your news to info@ChantiReviews.com

  • SIX days left to enter the Clue and M&M Book Awards!

    Eight Divisions close at the end of September!

    Don’t let your book miss out!

    Only 6 days left to submit your books to these prestigious CIBA Divisions and embark on an extraordinary journey to success. With over $30,000 in prizes awarded annually, now is the time to make your mark!

    The Clue Award for Thriller and Suspense Fiction and The Mystery and Mayhem Awards for Cozy and Not-so-Cozy Mysteries are still open!

    Best Book Grand Prize for the Chanticleer Int'l Book AwardsCongratulations to the Winners of the 2023 M&M Awards for Cozy and Not-so-cozy Mystery!

    Cozy Mystery Fiction Award

    • Liese Sherwood-Fabre – The Adventure of the Purloined Portrait
    • Gail Grant Park – We Are Shadows: An Irish Ghost Story
    • Rebecca Olmstead – Dreams and Illusions
    • Elizabeth Crowens – Hounds of the Hollywood Baskervilles
    • Patrick E. Craig – The Quilt That Knew
    • E. W. Finke – Coyote’s Wail
    • Lyn Squire – Immortalised to Death

    And a huge round of applause for the 2023 Mystery & Mayhem Awards Grand Prize Winner:

    A Haunting at Linley

    A Henrietta and Inspector Howard Novel

    by Michelle Cox 

    A Gold Ribbon dividing this section from the next

    Congratulations to the Winners of the 2023 Clue Awards for Thriller and Suspense!

    Thriller Suspense Fiction Award

    • Daniel V. Meier Jr. – Guidance to Death
    • Frederick Douglass Reynolds – Saint Bloodbath
    • Michelle Cox – A Haunting at Linley
    • Jode Millman – The Empty Kayak
    • Raymond Paul Johnson – The Raven Society: Conspiracy Ignited
    • Margaret Mizushima – Standing Dead: A Timber Creek K-9 Mystery

    And a huge round of applause for the 2023 Clue Awards Grand Prize Winner:

    The Other Murder

    By Kevin G. Chapman

    A Gold Ribbon dividing this section from the next

    The CIBAs offer more than just recognition — they provide a ladder to success with a range of achievement tiers and expert long tail marketing strategies. From the highly anticipated Long List to the prestigious Overall Grand Prize Winner, the CIBA lists energize both authors and readers, maximizing your digital footprint and expanding your fan base.

    The tiers of achievement for the CIBAs (Chanticleer Int'l Book Awards)

    We are always eager to support the Best Books through the CIBAs. Join the ranks of celebrated authors who have already taken this critical step in their publishing.

    Your book deserves to be discovered, celebrated, and shared with the world. Don’t miss the chance to showcase your talent and gain valuable exposure at the Chanticleer Authors Conference (April 3-6, 2025) where Winners from all 25 Book Award Divisions will be announced and honored.

    In a world hungry for good books, your story deserves to be heard. Submit now and leave a lasting impression.

    Let’s celebrate exceptional storytelling together!

    Blue button that says Enter a Writing Contest

    Your book deserves to be discovered

    Don’t Delay! Enter Today!

    The Clue Awards, and The M&M Awards

  • The Dante Rossetti 2024 Hall of Fame for YA Fiction!

    Got a Young Adult in your life?

    Dante Rossetti Awards for YA Fiction

    The Dante Rossetti Awards finds the best books for them!

    The Dante Rossetti Awards celebrate stories that bridge the gap between childhood and adulthood. Young readers exist in a liminal space, and we are pleased to feature Young Adult Fiction in the Chanticleer Int’l Book Awards!

    Join us in celebrating the previous Grand Prize Winners of the Dante Rossetti Awards!

    blue and gold badge recognizing Sour Flower by Maryanne Melloan Woods for winning the 2023 Dante Rossetti Grand Prize

    Sour Flower

    A Manuscript

    By Maryanne Melloan Woods

    The review is forthcoming, but this is our gut reaction to this beautiful story:

    Makes you cry in a good way with extraordinary beats. Coming of age and slice of life coupled with a story of redemption and finding terra firma after tragedy. Visceral, humorous, and very human.

    Learn more about Maryanne at her website here!

    Wages of Empire

    Wages of Empire
    By Michael J. Cooper

    Michael J. Cooper’s latest historical fiction novel, Wages of Empire, draws readers into the perilous journey of sixteen-year-old Evan Sinclair and his father into WW1. On this path, their lives will intersect with such historical figures as TE Lawrence, Gertrude Bell, the Zionist leader Chaim Weizmann, the Arab nationalist Faisal ibn Hussein, the proto-Nazi and advisor to the German kaiser Guido von List, and Kaiser Wilhelm II himself.

    Set in the summer of 1914 we find Evan living in the American southwest where his father moved the family from England for his Oxford sabbatical. Evan struggles to cope with his mother’s death in childbirth and yearns to escape his father’s controlling grip. As war breaks out in Europe, Evan decides to leave home and join the fight, without telling his father.

    Read More Here

    TARO Legendary Boy Hero of Japan Cover

    Taro: The Legendary Boy Hero of Japan
    By Blue Spruell

    Adventure, classic tales, fantasy, and exciting action combine in TARO: Legendary Boy Hero of Japan, a well-poised debut novel by award-winning author Blue Spruell.

    In the turbulent final decades of the sixteenth century, feudal Japan reeled in mayhem as the central hereditary dictatorship collapsed, and tyrannical powers fought to control the empire. TARO: The Legendary Boy Hero of Japan is the story of how one man revolutionized a nation by taking its reigns and forging a new destiny through his depths of compassion and determination.

    The story begins with Taro as a young boy. As an heir to the Takeda family, Taro enjoyed reading, much to his father’s disapproval, as he wanted him to follow in his footsteps as a skilled Samurai. Tragedy changes Taro’s presumed destiny when his parents are murdered in a fierce power struggle, leaving him an orphan. Shortly after, a witch saves him from drowning and begins Taro’s new life of adventure, introducing him to a world of mythical creatures. On this new journey, Taro discovers shocking secrets about his lineage, and with them, his ultimate purpose in medieval Japan.

    Read More Here

    Cover of The Best Week That Never Happened by Dallas Woodburn

    The Best Week That Never Happened
    By Dallas Woodburn

    Dallas Woodburn’s debut novel The Best Week that Never Happened is a roller-coaster ride through Hawaii and the mysterious depths of its briny deep, sparkling with unreal magic, a poignant romance, and incessant hope.

    Tegan Rossi, a freshly graduated eighteen-year-old, awakens in the secretive hideout she discovered with Kai Kapule as two eight-year-old children on her first trip to Hawaii Island. She needs to make amends with Kai as they had a major squabble over something very important that she now oddly forgets. When Tegan catches up with Kai in Hawaii, she enters her best week yet – the Best Week That Never Happened.

    The first-person narrative is a fusion of Tegan’s past three years ago and ten years ago, as well as a mystified chronicling of her present with Kai on the Big Island of Hawaii.

    Read More Here

    But Not Forever
    By Jan Von Schleh

    Like most fifteen-year-olds, Sonnet McKay loves a good adventure. Still, when she, her siblings, and cousins discover a deserted Victorian mansion in the middle of the woods outside a ghost town near Seattle, they get much more than they bargained for. In an upstairs bedroom, Sonnet inadvertently steps inside a time travel portal and is whisked away to 1895. In her place stands Emma Sweetwine, an identical doppelganger for Sonnet.

    Emma’s family was prominent when Monte Cristo was a booming mine town, but life is not what it seems for the oldest of the Sweetwine children. With a mother who seems to despise her and a secret engagement, Emma’s life is oppressive and controlled – a sharp contrast to the spirited, independent Sonnet. With no idea how or why they were switched, Sonnet and Emma must quickly adjust to their new environments and rely only on their closest friends and family. But like any good story, time is running out for the girls as both of their lives rush in opposite directions. They must find a way back to their own times before their chance is gone forever.

    Read More Here

    Whispers
    By Lynn Yvonne Moon

    Whispers by Lynn Yvonne Moon explores the issue of incest through the life of twelve-year-old Musetta, whose father has just died. We meet Musetta at her father’s funeral and realize that this girl is dealing with serious issues. Still, more than grief, she’s filled with rage – and relief. And we cannot blame her. Whispers is filled with enough intrigue and family secrets to glue readers’ eyeballs to the page and hug their parents when they reach the end of the tale.

    Musetta can’t get the attention of her grieving mother, and she’s not sure who she can turn to for help. Who will believe her story? But she knows what happened to her. After her father’s funeral, she believes the Friday night ritual of rape is over and that the molestation will stop. However, it’s not quite that easy.

    First off, there are voices in her bedroom walls – and worse, the molestation continues. Is it her father’s ghost? She can’t go to her mother for help, and she won’t go to the law unless her mother is by her side. Who would believe her over her late father’s reputation as an upstanding citizen and the favorite local judge?

    Read More Here


    You know you want it…

    Now that you’re set on your next reads, what are you waiting for? The only way to join this amazing list of Dante Rossetti Winners is to enter today!

  • The 2024 Chaucer Book Awards Spotlight for Early Historical Fiction

    A Tale as Old as Time

    The Chaucer Awards for Historical Novels

    Join one of Chanticleer’s oldest and most prestigious Book Awards today!

    The Chaucer Awards are named after Geoffrey Chaucer, the author of The Canterbury Tales. But Chaucer was hardly the only writer of past ages. Female writers of the past are often overlooked, so during this Award cycle, we’re going to highlight some of them in Chaucer posts.

    The Disk of Enheduanna, discovered in 1927 by Leonard Wooley, now in the Penn Museum

    The oldest known writer in history is Enheduanna

    She was High Priestess of the Sumerian Moon Goddess Nanna, and Daughter of Sargon the Great, the first King of the Akkadian empire. Living in approximately 2300 BCE, she composed 42 temple hymns and 3 stand-alone poems. While her Father was uniting Mesopotamia and creating one of the worlds first empires, she was uniting their religions, her hymns being used to combine the worship of Inanna and Ishtar. One of her poems, Inanna and Ebih, even has the distinction of being the first text to have illustrations.

    Another female writer, Murasaki Shikibu, wrote Genji Monogatari, also known as The Tale of Genji in about 1000- 1012 CE in Japan.

    The Tale of Genji is considered to be one of the worlds first Novels, directly inspired by her life as a Lady-in-waiting in the Royal court. What’s interesting about her novel is how much of it centers on the female perspective, of the women in Genji’s life and how they shaped his fate. While the book is an amazing example and look into Japanese Culture at that time, it also still has points that are still able to be seen in Modern Japanese society. It is however thought that the last 10 chapters may have been written by her daughter, poet Daini no Sanmi.

    However, the Chaucer Awards focus on work written in the last 3 years.

    The Categories for the Chaucer award are:

    • Pre-Historical Fiction- Anything before written history. Neolithic and Neanderthal type stories. The Clan of The Cave Bear by Jean Auel or The Lost World by Arthur Conan Doyle are good examples.
    • Ancient Historical Fiction- Greek, Roman, Egyptian; Classical History
    • Dark Ages, Medieval, Renaissance
    • Elizabethan/Tudor
    • 1600s
    • World/International History Pre-1750s
    • Americas- Historical Fiction Pre-1750s
    • Legend Based Pre-1750s Historical Fiction (Arthurian, Beowulf, Chaucer)
    • Norse/Celtic
    You know you want it…

    Enter Today!

    We are delighted to celebrate the 2023 Winners of the Chaucer Awards who have already started to make their mark on the genre!

    • Gina Buonaguro – The Virgins of Venice
    • Griffin Brady – The Hussar’s Duty
    • Robert S Phillips – Elodia’s Knife
    • Rozsa Gaston – Margaret of Austria
    • Rebecca Kightlinger – The Lady of the Cliffs: The Bury Down Chronicles, Book Two
    • C.V. Lee – Token of Betrayal

    The Grand Prize Winner for the CIBA 2023 CHAUCER Awards is:

    The Merchant from Sepharad

    By James Hutson-Wiley

    blue and gold badge recognizing The Merchant from Sepharad by James Hutson-Wiley for winning the 2023 Chaucer Grand Prize


    Now it is our pleasure to celebrate some of the Early Historical Fiction that’s come to us lately!

    EDGED In PURPLE
    By John W. Feist

    Edged in Purple by John W. Feist welcomes readers to a place outside of time and space, a liminal space where characters of myth wait to return to their fated stories.

    The Fold is a beautiful land, a near-utopia shepherded– literally– by Thetis and Peleus of Greek mythology. They raise the heroine of Shakespeare’s The Winter’s Tale, Perdita, after her father had accused her mother of betraying him with another, the whole sad story a product of his own paranoia.

    Perdita’s story is proceeding as it was written. She has already met Florizel, the man who should be the hero of her romance– when her story is intersected by another. Just as The Winter’s Tale features royal courts, doomed relationships, mistaken identities, and family murder, so too does an ancient Greek drama: the Oresteia of Aeschylus, the story of Agamemnon after the Trojan War.

    Read more here!

    DAUGHTER Of HADES
    By Mack Little

    Mack Little’s historical fiction novel Daughter of Hades explores the lives of slaves during the age of pirates.

    Little’s research shines in her thoughtful presentation of the Caribbean islands, the escaped slaves who found freedom amongst them, the lives of buccaneers and maroons, and their daring and dangerous exploits.

    On the first page, Little introduces us to Geraldine, or “Dinny”, running for her life from her owner, Owen Craig, who has just raped her.

    Read more here!

    THE SHERIFF: Book Three of The Druid Chronicles
    By A.M. Linden

    The Sheriff Cover

    The Sheriff, the third installment of A.M. Linden’s Druid Chronicles series about 9th-century life in Anglo-Saxon England, fully immerses readers in that distant era with all of its joys, conflicts, and hardships.

    Trained from his youngest years in the military, Stefan has learned both battle skills and leadership, with the ability to approach a situation without causing it to get out of hand. He is fiercely loyal, but continually denied a larger role in the kingdom’s army. His latest indignity came with the king assigning him as sheriff of Codswallow, a paltry village. With a retinue of less than 10 people including his slave, he has to collect taxes and keep the peace.

    The novel shows two major episodes. The first follows his Codswallow days, including his relationship with Jonathan, owner of the Three Dragons Inn. Stefan learns that Jonathan is paying protection money to keep bandits away from the inn, and carries out a series of plans to discover who is, what we could call, the crime boss.

    Read more here!

    ELODIA’S KNIFE
    By Robert S. Phillips

    Elodia is a young woman driven by dreadful circumstances to act with deadly force in the Robert S. Phillips novel Elodia’s Knife.

    What Elodia hoped would be her leap away from danger instead left her surrounded by perilous threats that now threaten to consume her. Armed with her courage, determination, instincts, and a trusty knife, Elodia faces a hostile world in foreign territory.

    Not all are against her though. Allies– even a friend– can be found, if Elodia can summon the bravery to listen to her feelings and own deep wishes.

    Read more here!


    Thank you to these wonderful authors for shedding light on the past with us!

    The tiers of achievement for the CIBAs

    We hope to see your work in the 2024 Chaucer Awards!

    This is the journey from beginning to end for the CIBAs Levels of Achievement is so worthwhile! Every list you make means more promotion for you and your work as each list is posted right here on our website, on our social media, and also out in our newsletter!

    Your book deserves to be discovered

    Sources:

  • 8 days left to submit three Historical Book Awards in the CIBAs!

    Eight Divisions close in September!

    Eight excellent divisions close at the end of September!

    Don’t let your book miss out!

    Only 8 days left to submit your books to these prestigious CIBA Divisions and embark on an extraordinary journey to success. With over $30,000 in prizes awarded annually, now is the time to make your mark!

    The Chaucer Awards for Early Historical Fiction, The Goethe Awards for Late Historical Fiction, and the Laramie Awards for Western and Americana Fiction are still open!

    Best Book Grand Prize for the Chanticleer Int'l Book AwardsCongratulations to the Winners of the 2023 Chaucer Award for Historical Fiction!

    The Chaucer Awards for Historical Novels

    • Gina Buonaguro – The Virgins of Venice
    • Griffin Brady – The Hussar’s Duty
    • Robert S Phillips – Elodia’s Knife
    • Rozsa Gaston – Margaret of Austria
    • Rebecca Kightlinger – The Lady of the Cliffs: The Bury Down Chronicles, Book Two
    • C.V. Lee – Token of Betrayal 

    And a huge round of applause for the 2023 Chaucer Grand Prize Winner:

    The Merchant from Sepharad by James Hutson-Wiley

    A Gold Ribbon dividing this section from the next

    Congratulations to the Winners of the 2023 Goethe Awards!

    Post 1750s Historical Fiction Award

    • Lisa Voelker – The Spoon
    • Robert W Smith – A Long Way from Clare
    • Mitzi Zilka – Water Fire Steam
    • Susanne Dunlap – The Adored One
    • Linda Ulleseit – The River Remembers
    • Nicole Evelina – Catherine’s Mercy
    • William Maz – Bucharest Legacy: The Rise of the Oligarchs

    And a huge round of applause for the 2023 Goethe Awards Grand Prize Winner:

    If Someday Comes by David Calloway

    If Someday Comes Cover

    A Gold Ribbon dividing this section from the next

    Congratulations to the 2023 Winners of the Laramie Awards!

    Western Pioneeer Civil War Fiction Award

    • Barbara Salvatore – The Trail to Niobrara
    • T.K. Conklin – Promise of Spring
    • Elizabeth Woolsey – The Travels of Dr. Rebecca Harper A Matter of Time
    • Daniel Greene – Northern Dawn (Northern Wolf Series Book 4)
    • K.S. Jones – Tastefully Texas

    And a huge round of applause for the 2023 Laramie Grand Prize Winner:

    The Last Man: A Novel of the 1927 Santa Claus Bank Robbery by Thomas Goodman

    A Gold Ribbon dividing this section from the next

    The CIBAs offer more than just recognition — they provide a ladder to success with a range of achievement tiers and expert long tail marketing strategies. From the highly anticipated Long List to the prestigious Overall Grand Prize Winner, the CIBA lists energize both authors and readers, maximizing your digital footprint and expanding your fan base.

    The tiers of achievement for the CIBAs (Chanticleer Int'l Book Awards)

    We are always eager to support the Best Books through the CIBAs. Join the ranks of celebrated authors who have already taken this critical step in their publishing.

    Your book deserves to be discovered, celebrated, and shared with the world. Don’t miss the chance to showcase your talent and gain valuable exposure at the Chanticleer Authors Conference (April 3-6, 2025) where Winners from all 25 Book Award Divisions will be announced and honored.

    In a world hungry for good books, your story deserves to be heard. Submit now and leave a lasting impression.

    Let’s celebrate exceptional storytelling together!

    Don’t Delay! Enter Today!

    The Chaucer Awards, The Laramie Awards, and The Goethe Awards

    Your book deserves to be discovered