The Hemingway Book Awards recognize emerging new talent and outstanding works in the genre of 20th Century Wartime Fiction. The Hemingway Awards is a genre division of Chanticleer International Book Awards and Novel Competitions (The CIBAs).
The Hemingway Book Awards competition is named for Ernest Hemingway who was born July 21, 1899.
Chanticleer International Book Awards is looking for the best books featuring 20th Century Wartime Fiction in Historical Fiction; Romance and Romantic Fiction; Mysteries, Thrillers, and Suspense Fiction of the time; Literary works and Satire and anything else that author imaginations can dream up for the HEMINGWAY Book Awards division. We will put them to the test and choose the best among them.
For Post-1750s Historical Fiction, see our Goethe Awards here. For other Historical Fiction categories, please see more details here.
These titles have moved forward from the 2024 HEMINGWAY Wartime Fiction LONG LIST to the 2024 Hemingway Book Awards SHORT LIST. The Short Listers will compete for the Semi-Finalists positions. FINALISTS will be chosen from the Semi-Finalists and recognized at the Chanticleer Authors Conference, CAC25.
We will announce the 1st Place Category winners and Grand Prize Division Winners at the CIBAs Banquet and Ceremony on Saturday, April 5th, 2025 in beautiful Bellingham, WA at the Four Points by Sheraton sponsored by the 2025Chanticleer Authors Conference.
These titles are in the running for the SEMI-FINALISTS of the 2024 Hemingway Book Awards novel competition for Wartime Fiction!
Join us in cheering on the following authors and their works!
Gary Baysinger – What We Say in the Dark
Larry Allen Lindsey – One Rogue Raider
Mark Barie – For King Country and Love
Mark Demeza – The Thirteenth Child
R L Pace – Rising Son
Michael J. Summers – Cherry Blossoms in Winter
David Scott Richardson – An Empty House Doesn’t Sneeze
Dave Mason – Between the Clouds and the River
Kregg P.J. Jorgenson – Sweet Sorrow: Book 3 of The Jungle War series
Katherine Koch – The Sower of Black Field: Inspired by the True Story of an American in Nazi Germany
J.A. Nunn – The Stuff What Actually Is
Tim Turner and Moisey Gorbaty – The Reluctant Conductor
Kay Smith-Blum – Tangles
Shanna Hatfield – Molly
Bruce K. Berger – Brothers Bound
Gary Santos – A Grand Pause
Kathryn Gauci – Midnight in Istanbul
Steve Bassett – Love In the Shadows Passaic River Trilogy Comes to an End
Loretta Goldberg – Beyond the Bukubuk Tree: A World War II Novel of Love and Loss
Libby Fischer Hellmann – Max’s War: The Story of a Ritchie Boy
Julie Burnette – An Island Long Ago
Jillianne Hamilton – The Land Girl on Lily Road
Jillianne Hamilton – The Hobby Shop on Barnaby Street
Travis Davis – One of Four: World War One Through the Eyes of an Unknown Soldier
Bharati Sen – My War, My Child
Ingrid McCarthy – Anna’s Shadow
Miles Watson – Sinner’s Cross
Constance Hays Matsumoto & Kent Matsumoto – Of White Ashes
H. W. “Buzz” Bernard – When Heroes Flew
Elaine Aucoin Schroller – The Bravest Soldiers
Good luck to all as your works move on to the next rounds of judging.
PROMOTING OUR AUTHORS!
This post has been posted on the Chanticleer Facebook Page. We try to tag all authors listed here in the Facebook post. However, it is easier for us to tag authors when they have Liked and Followed us on Facebook.
Seating is Limited. The esteemed WRITER Magazine (founded in 1887) has repeatedly recognized the Chanticleer Authors Conference as one of the best conferences to attend and participate in for North America.
The Hemingway Book Awards recognize emerging new talent and outstanding works in the genre of 20th Century Wartime Fiction. The Hemingway Awards is a genre division of Chanticleer International Book Awards and Novel Competitions (The CIBAs).
The Hemingway Book Awards competition is named for Ernest Hemingway who was born July 21, 1899.
Chanticleer International Book Awards is looking for the best books featuring 20th Century Wartime Fiction in Historical Fiction; Romance and Romantic Fiction; Mysteries, Thrillers, and Suspense Fiction of the time; Literary works and Satire and anything else that author imaginations can dream up for the HEMINGWAY Book Awards division. We will put them to the test and choose the best among them.
For Post-1750s Historical Fiction, see our Goethe Awards here. For other Historical Fiction categories, please see more details here.
These titles have moved forward in the first look rounds from all 2024 HEMINGWAY Wartime Fiction entries to the 2024 Hemingway Book Awards LONG LIST. These entries are now in competition for the 2024 Hemingway Short List. The Short Listers will compete for the Semi-Finalists positions. FINALISTS will be chosen from the Semi-Finalists and recognized at the Chanticleer Authors Conference, CAC25.
We will announce the 1st Place Category winners and Grand Prize Division Winners at the CIBAs Banquet and Ceremony on Saturday, April 5th, 2025 in beautiful Bellingham, WA at the Four Points by Sheraton sponsored by the 2025Chanticleer Authors Conference.
These titles are in the running for the SHORT LIST of the 2024 Hemingway Book Awards novel competition for Wartime Fiction!
Join us in cheering on the following authors and their works!
Gary Baysinger – What We Say in the Dark
Dian Greenwood – Forever Blackbirds
Larry Allen Lindsey – One Rogue Raider
Kevin Schewe Md – Bad Love Medicine the Bad Love Series Book
Mark Barie – For King Country and Love
Mark Kraver – Janszoon in the Pursuit of Love Family and an Enduring Legacy
Mark Demeza – The Thirteenth Child
R L Pace – Rising Son
Michael J. Summers – Cherry Blossoms in Winter
David Scott Richardson – An Empty House Doesn’t Sneeze
Dave Mason – Between the Clouds and the River
Kregg P.J. Jorgenson – Sweet Sorrow: Book 3 of The Jungle War series
Katherine Koch – The Sower of Black Field: Inspired by the True Story of an American in Nazi Germany
Peter J. Marzano – Taken from Carinhall
J.A. Nunn – The Stuff What Actually Is
Diana Lee – The Green Crossing
Tim Turner and Moisey Gorbaty – The Reluctant Conductor
John Middleton – Noble Conspiracy
Kay Smith-Blum – Tangles
Shanna Hatfield – Molly
Bruce K. Berger – Brothers Bound
Gary Santos – A Grand Pause
Kathryn Gauci – Midnight in Istanbul
Steve Bassett – Love In the Shadows Passaic River Trilogy Comes to an End
Loretta Goldberg – Beyond the Bukubuk Tree: A World War II Novel of Love and Loss
Libby Fischer Hellmann – Max’s War: The Story of a Ritchie Boy
Julie Burnette – An Island Long Ago
Jillianne Hamilton – The Land Girl on Lily Road
Jillianne Hamilton – The Hobby Shop on Barnaby Street
Travis Davis – One of Four: World War One Through the Eyes of an Unknown Soldier
Bharati Sen – My War, My Child
Ingrid McCarthy – Anna’s Shadow
Miles Watson – Sinner’s Cross
Jamie Kirkpatrick – This Salted Soil
Constance Hays Matsumoto & Kent Matsumoto – Of White Ashes
H. W. “Buzz” Bernard – When Heroes Flew
Elaine Aucoin Schroller – The Bravest Soldiers
Good luck to all as your works move on to the next rounds of judging.
PROMOTING OUR AUTHORS!
This post has been posted on the Chanticleer Facebook Page. We try to tag all authors listed here in the Facebook post. However, it is easier for us to tag authors when they have Liked and Followed us on Facebook.
Seating is Limited. The esteemed WRITER Magazine (founded in 1887) has repeatedly recognized the Chanticleer Authors Conference as one of the best conferences to attend and participate in for North America.
Wartime Fiction set in the twentieth century asks us to reflect most keenly on the most difficult times in our recent history. At Chanticleer, we are here to face war time history with the Hemingway Awards in Historical Fiction; Romance and Romantic Fiction; Mysteries, Thrillers, and Suspense Fiction of the time; Literary works and Satire and anything else that author imaginations can dream up.
Please note that fictional accounts of the United States Civil War should be submitted to the Laramie Book Awards for Americana Fiction. It is sobering to note that more human life was lost in the Civil War than in ALL of the wars, battles, and skirmishes that the U.S. has participated in added together. Civil wars are considered to be the most deadly of all wars.
Historical Book Awards here at Chanticleer Reviews and the CIBAS.
The CIBAs started with one historical fiction division, The Chaucer Book Awards, which split off the Goethe Book Awards for post-1750s historical fiction. Then the Goethe Book Awards split off a new division, the Hemingway Book Awards for Wartime Fiction.
The Hemingway Awards might be young, but we already have Four Amazing Grand Prize Winners to share with you!
The Silver Waterfall: A Novel of the Battle of Midway
By Kevin Miller
In The Silver Waterfall, author retired U.S. Navy Captain Kevin Miller reveals the intricate and deadly turns of the Battle of Midway, a combat shaped by transforming warfare, and one that would in turn shape the rest of WWII’s Pacific Theater.
After their surprise attack on Pearl Harbor, the Japanese Navy seeks to draw American aircraft carriers into an ambush, to secure Japanese power over the Pacific. In a time of great upheaval for warfare technology, aircraft carriers dominated both sea and sky. So, to destroy the USS Enterprise, Yorktown, and Hornet, Chūichi Nagumo— commander of the Japanese First Air Fleet— brings to bear his own four carriers, HIJMS Akagi, Hiryū, Kaga, and Soryu.
But the Americans had cracked the Japanese communication codes, so as the First Air Fleet launches their provoking attack against the Midway Islands, the American carriers are already steaming into position. From June 4th to June 6th of 1942, planes filled the skies above the remote Pacific waters, both American and Japanese pilots dashing back and forth, knowing that either they sink the enemy’s carriers, or they’ll have none of their own to return to.
Robert W. Smith tells the story of a forgotten war and the fractured peace that follows in his powerful historical fiction novel, Running with Cannibals.
It has been said that “War is hell.” It has also been opined that “It is well that war is so terrible, or we should grow too fond of it.” Running with Cannibals is a no-holds-barred, candid portrayal of a war that is glossed over in U.S. history, the Philippine-American War of 1899-1902. It was the first war fought overseas by the U.S.
Running with Cannibals begins with an unnamed man on the run from an unjust accusation bought with blood and money.
A young boy in Norway makes a discovery while playing with his dog, opening the mystery of EO-N by Dave Mason, a detective story spanning multiple decades and both sides of the Atlantic, a deep dive into the horrors of Nazi Germany, and a heartfelt love story.
A small metal fragment leads to the discovery of a downed WWII twin-engine Mosquito fighter-bomber hidden in snow and glacial ice for nearly 75 years. The crash site yields an initial set of clues, one of which finds its way across the world to Alison Wiley, a biotech CEO in Seattle. Having recently lost her mother, and, a few years earlier, her brother in Afghanistan, she finds her days full of despair, but the discovery makes a distant connection to her long-lost grandfather, and she flies to Norway. There, she meets Scott Wilcox, a Canadian researcher assigned to investigate the discovery after his government learned that the crashed aircraft belonged to the Royal Canadian Air Force. Their attraction is both intellectual and emotional, but the quest to uncover the plane’s mysteries and the fate of Alison’s grandfather place any romance to the side.
At first, the crash doesn’t appear exceptional, until certain contradictory and confusing clues emerge that make it clear that the circumstances that led to the plane’s fate were anything but simple.
During World War II “quisling” became a byword for a particular type of traitor, one who not only betrays their own country but also actively collaborates with the invaders. The origin of the term was taken from an actual person, a Norwegian named Vidkun Quisling, who didn’t merely cooperate with the Nazis but actually headed a collaborationist regime in his own country.
The Quisling Factor takes place in the immediate post-war period, as the Nuremberg Trials are gearing up in Germany. Norway is conducting its own post-war legal purge of collaborators at all levels of government.
The story is a direct follow-up to the author’s award-winning World War II novel, The Jøssing Affair. This second novel focuses on the physical and emotional toll of war, and its precarious weight of peace on the survivors.
Now that you’re set on your next reads, what are you waiting for? The only way to join this amazing list of Hemingway Winners is to submit today!
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 Hemingway Book Awards recognize emerging new talent and outstanding works in the genre of 20th Century Wartime Fiction. The Grand Prize Winner, Kevin Miller’s book, The Silver Waterfall, will be promoted for years to come in our annual Hall of Fame article, as well as be featured on the Hemingway contest page year ’round!
The best part about being a Chanticleer Int’l Book Award Winner is the love and attention you get all year ‘round!
An experienced intelligence agent at 22, Tore Haugland faces certain danger when he accepts an assignment in occupied Norway knowing that his predecessor was killed by the Gestapo only a week before. The dying agent left a mysterious message in his interruption code that London calls the “Brisling Code.” London wants Haugland to find out what it means as well as to gather information on the expansion of the U boat base in Bergen. Haugland is sent to work at a drafting office in a shipyard. His mission is jeopardized when a ruthless SS officer, Hans Becker, with his own secrets, is alerted to his presence by a traitor at the Verks. Becker will do anything to find him. If Haugland can’t discover the meaning of the Brisling Code in time, it could cost him his life and expose the members of the local resistance he works with. If he does, it could hurt the people he has grown to care about. But what if the message was written down wrong?
From Chanticleer:
In The Brisling Code, a fast-paced first installment of her historical thriller series, Oakley weaves a brilliant portrayal of the perils met by the Norwegian Resistance during WWII.
Layered perspectives—from resistance workers, traitors, and even an SS Officer—create a rich world through which readers can understand the sacrifices that were made to free our world from the tyranny of Nazi Germany.
Immersed in volatile Nazi-occupied Bergen, Norway, fearless young intelligence agent Tore Haugland and his team of organizers work tirelessly to protect the essential work of the Norwegian resistance.
Haugland’s task is to uncover the plans for the expansion of the German Uboat base with inside help at a shipyard. Also charged in unveiling the meaning behind a mysterious message sent by his murdered predecessor, Haugland navigates the treacherous waters of Norway—a mere haunting of the beautiful city it once was before Nazi occupation. Readers can “almost taste the danger” as our hero moves from one treacherous predicament to the next. Haugland’s mission risks not only his own life, but the lives of every friend and connection he makes.
When France declares war on Germany, the villagers of the sleepy village of Mont-Saint-Jean have no idea how much their lives will be impacted. At first they find themselves helping a trickle of British soldiers and airmen heading into Spain, but within months, that trickle has turned into a never-ending flow. Desperate French and foreign Jews, together with ordinary men and women evading Vichy’s harsh laws in search of freedom, either attempt to flee and join de Gaulle’s Secret Army in North Africa, or hide and regroup in readiness for D-Day. Before they know it, they are drawn into the shadowy world of escape networks in one of France’s harshest and most dangerous mountainous terrains, where at every turn they face deportation or death if caught.
Rich in detail and based on true events in Occupied France, In the Shadow of the Pyrenees weaves together a powerful and vivid tableau of characters, a tortured love affair, and the heroism of countless helpers. It is a story that conjures up the voices of the past and will take you on a journey in which the ensuing upheavals continue to resonate in the villagers’ lives long after the war has ended.
This work is not yet released, but the previous book in the series was the 2022 Dante Rossetti Grand Prize Winner.
In the summer of 1914, sixteen-year-old Evan Sinclair leaves home to join the Great War for Civilization. Little does he know that, despite the war raging in Europe, the true source of conflict will emerge in Ottoman Palestine, since it’s from Jerusalem where the German Kaiser dreams to rule as Holy Roman Emperor.
Filled with such historical figures as Gertrude Bell, T.E. Lawrence, Winston Churchill, Faisal bin Hussein and Chaim Weizmann, Wages of Empire follows Evan through the killing fields of the Western Front where he will help turn the tide of a war that is just beginning, and become part of a story that never ends.
From Chanticleer:
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.
By the time Clive realizes Evan is missing, the war is in full swing. Clive returns to England to search for Evan and reactivates his commission at the War Office in London. There, Clive uses every means available to find Evan. Meanwhile, Evan has made his way across the Atlantic and into France with the hope of joining the British Expeditionary Force (BEF), but instead he is arrested by the Paris police as a possible German collaborator. He escapes, but by mistake, crosses into occupied Belgium where he barely survives a German artillery barrage with poison gas. Joining the Flemish resistance, he is badly wounded after helping to flood the lowlands, a deciding factor in stopping the German army. After recovering in a BEF hospital in France, Evan begins a romance with a beautiful young nurse just before he is discharged to return to England by hospital ship.
In late 1950’s Cuba, the island’s allure as an elite global paradise was cloaked by a revolution that brought down its rich and powerful.
When a poor native farm boy named Victor Gomez is suddenly orphaned and adopted by one of the most influential families in his hometown, he meets and falls for Sarita Rodriguez—a supermodel and media empire heiress—just before Fidel Castro overthrows President Fulgencio Batista and takes control of the island. After Castro raids Victor’s new family’s estate and imprisons his father, Victor narrowly escapes and flees to the US where he accepts an unconventional, deadly deal as a spy to save his country. Still just a teen, Victor finds himself in a cycle of betrayal—struggling to find truth and purpose, while torn between protecting his now powerless parents, finding his disbanded biological siblings, and secretly pursuing Sarita as she rises to international fame from New York.
Based on the true story of the author’s family, Isla Vulnerable weaves a captivating tale of love, sacrifice, and human resilience in the face of extraordinary historical events—including the Cold War, the Cuban missile crisis, the CIA’s covert operations in foreign affairs, Operation Mongoose, and the assassination of JFK. A dynamic cast of real-life-inspired characters, meticulous attention to historical detail, edge-of-your-seat spy scenes, and a love story that transcends social classes compose an ideologically-unbiased, heartwarming, and cinematic journey in this author’s first published book.
Twenty-year-old Kate is poised to launch into a long-anticipated life of independence when Britain declares war in 1939. After that announcement, her dream of escaping the London suburb she grew up in and pursuing a singing career is quashed: she must stay put with her family and prepare for bombing and possible invasion by Germany.
Living in these anxious times, Kate strives to achieve balance in her life, though a speech disability interferes with her singing and a failed romance adds to her distress. But when a young Jewish girl whose parents have been deported comes to her for help, Kate’s goals change. Taking on a responsibility she never could have imagined, she learns that freedom and survival cannot be taken for granted—and as new responsibilities outweigh earlier goals, she learns that assisting others to escape unspeakable evil requires new perspective, as well as courage she didn’t know she had.
In 1915, Simon Temple, a young naval officer from northeast England, finds himself aboard RMS Guardian, patrolling the North Sea as part of the Germany blockade. By midyear, he’s in Petrograd, Russia on a private assignment for King George. The three-month task turns into three years, embroiling him in the intrigues of two royal families, Russian politics and British espionage. As the Russian revolution consumes the country, Simon’s cover is threatened, and his safety compromised. He must escape the chaos before he’s captured, but his scheme becomes complicated when two others unexpectedly join him in a hasty departure.
High seas adventures. Russian vistas. Royal exposé. Political conspiracy. The stuff of which spies are made. Tsarina’s Crown is a fast-paced, historical drama that leads the reader from World War I at sea to the desperation of the Russian revolution. Full of action and intrigue. And just a little romance.
From Chanticleer:
Jerena Tobiasen delivers a sharp, first-rate novel in Tsarina’s Crown, first installment in TheNightingale and Sparrow Chronicles, capturing a precise panorama of Russian politics and British espionage during a delicate period in time.
The year is 1915 and Simon Temple, a young naval officer aboard the RMS Guardian— a British Royal Navy Ship— patrols the North Sea for questionable communications and marine activity. Months later, he is entrusted by the British crown to serve as a liaison on a covert mission in Petrograd, Russia. Simon is careful not to blow his cover as a young aristocrat while he is thrust into the world of international politics, the ruthless Russian Revolution, and becomes caught right in the middle of two powerful royal families.
The mission turns out to be longer than Simon anticipated, and his life quickly becomes threatened as he tries to navigate a dangerous political labyrinth, all the while hoping to unearth the spy information that his King requires of him. But as the precarious wheel of mayhem and chaos churns in Russia, Simon’s only way to survive is to escape, realizing that his wit and intelligence might not save him from the tense political atmosphere. Things become even more complicated when he is joined by two other people who hope to flee.
Weymouth, England 1939. War changes everything. For grandson Martin, coming of age under the backdrop of World War II. For Sonja, the Jewish refugee he’s drawn to, who left her family in Germany only to face new dangers in England. And for Martin’s friend, Ellis, confronting a war similar to the one that drove his father to alcoholism.
Recently widowed, Alice must set aside her long-awaited chance to recreate her life on her own terms when the war places her two grandchildren in her care. She finds herself revisiting the tragedies she faced as a mother, as she navigates personal aspiration, loss, and the importance of family.
Alice’s War is not a story of decorated air pilots or daring resistance fighters. It is instead a story of ordinary people facing fear and loss. As outside forces tear Alice’s family and community apart, she quietly gathers and reforms their sustaining bonds.
Set in the town of Weymouth against the grand backdrop of England’s Jurassic Coast and with a front-seat view of the unfolding drama, Alice’s War immerses the reader in a time unlike any in modern history.
Only 14 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!
Congratulations to the Winners of the 2023 Paranormal Awards for Supernatural Fiction!
Joe Lyon – The Molossus of Old Man Moyer: An Original Horror Novel
Jo Deniau – Hologram
Nola Nash – House of Mirrors
Claire Fraise – They Stay
Fionn Mac Meldrum – The Shadow of Banshee Hill
James McKenna – An October’s Journey: Poe’s Final Gift
And a huge round of applause for the 2023 Paranormal Awards Grand Prize Winner:
Becoming Crone
by Lydia M Hawke
Congratulations to the Winners of the 2023 Global Thriller Awards for High Stakes Thrillers!
D. L. Wilburn Jr. – The God Protocol: Dragon
Glenn Dyer – Trust No One
Mark James – Friendship Games
Randall Krzak – Ultimate Escalation
Susan Rogers and John Roosen – Cobra Pose
And a huge round of applause for the 2023 Global Thriller Awards Grand Prize Winner:
Jake Fortina and The Roman Conspiracy
By Ralph R. “Rick” Steinke
Congratulations to the Winners of the 2023 Hemingway Awards for 20th Century Wartime Fiction!
J.L. Oakley – The Brisling Code
Kathryn Gauci – In the Shadow of the Pyrenees
Michael J Cooper – Crossroads of Empire
Ivan Luiz Hernandez – Isla Vulnerable
Linda Stewart Henley – Kate’s War
Jerena Tobiasen – Tsarina’s Crown
William McClain – Alice’s War
And a huge round of applause for the 2023 Hemingway Awards Grand Prize Winner:
The Silver Waterfall
A Novel of The Battle of Midway
by Kevin Miller
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.
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.
The Hemingway Awards is our Division for Historical Fiction of 20th Century Wartime. Named for famed War Correspondent and Author Ernest Hemingway, his writings embody much of what this award covers. He didn’t write only war related content, but A Farewell to Arms and For Whom The Bell Tolls are both amazing looks into the rather tumultuous early 20th century.
These are the categories for the 2024 Hemingway Awards for 20th and 21st century Wartime Fiction:
World War 1
World War 2
Women in War
Occupation/ Diaspora
Espionage
Love in Wartime
Specific Campaign/ Theater/ Battle
The dropping of a nuclear bomb in Stanley Kubrik’s dark satire “Dr. Strangelove”
The Grand Prize Winner for the CIBA 2023 Hemingway Book Awards is:
The Silver Waterfall
A Novel of The Battle of Midway
by Kevin Miller
We love stories about wartime history here at Chanticleer. Here are some of the best books we’ve reviewed recently.
AN EMPTY HOUSE DOESN’T SNEEZE
By David Scott Richardson
In David Scott Richardson’s YA WWII historical novel, An Empty House Doesn’t Sneeze, teenager Scott Johannsen—“Scotty” to his mom and friends—leads us on an adventure through the wartime Ravenna neighborhood in Seattle, Washington.
Boeing manufactures B-17s, his grandparents and neighbors grow victory gardens, his parents build a bomb shelter in their basement, and mandatory blackouts occur every night. Scotty navigates a chaotic world filled with danger and wonder yet finds security with family and friends in this heartfelt story.
Scotty runs with his pack—James, Marty, and Burr. We witness what lengths they will go to on a search for chocolate. With Ravenna Park as a backyard and Puget Sound just a short drive away, Scotty’s life is filled with exploration of the natural world. His fishing adventures with his dad in the Sound become an exciting way to supplement his family’s food rations as he dreams about netting a fighting salmon.
ROSES In DECEMBER: Hamilton Place, Book 2
By Mark A. Gibson
Roses in December is the epic conclusion to Mark A. Gibson’s compelling two-part family saga, Hamilton Place. Now focusing on the family’s next generation, James Hamilton Jr.—Jimmy—follows in the footsteps of the father he never met, a Vietnam War hero who died in battle, and ultimately finds his own path in life.
Pressured by a conning mother-in-law only out for monetary gain, the elder Jimmy’s widow, Becca, is pushed to marry Mack Lee, her deceased husband’s older brother who proves to be a cheating and abusive husband. Trapped in this loveless marriage, Becca hopes that attending church will remove her son from the toxic influence of her new husband and set him on the right path to a good life. But it’s the discovery of young Jimmy’s superior photographic memory that opens the door to a brighter future, and he sets a course to an outstanding medical career, coupled with military service in Afghanistan.
Gibson delivers the recent past with a great sense of immediacy, showing events that ripple into our contemporary world using pop references that are relevant in today’s world.
The arrival of a mysterious package makes for an enticing beginning in J. Shep’s After Me. Inside we find a manuscript with the same text as the book we’re about to read. This inventive start lends a sense of realism and truth to what follows and creates a vivid yet hazy quality, like memory itself.
After Me travels back in time to rural France just after World War II. The setting appears idyllic at first—almost unbelievably so. Still, there’s a disturbing undercurrent felt from the start. Not from an unwanted presence, but rather from an absence.
Told from the perspective of Ellande, a young boy, he recounts the summer his parents die in an accident and he and his nine-year-old little sister, Madeleine-Grace, are sent to their extended family’s summer home in France. Their care seems competent at first—but cracks in the façade gradually emerge as Ellande begins his tale.
EVERYTHING WE HAD: No Merciful War Book 1
By Tom Burkhalter
Everything We Had, book one of Tom Burkhalter’s No Merciful War series is an inexorable thrill that will grip readers tight. It starts with a poker game, through which a main character’s luck soon becomes evident. But will that luck hold out?
Jack—the poker player—and Charlie—Jack’s older brother—have been separated by war, even though that war has yet to be declared. Everything We Had focuses more on the machinations leading up to US involvement in World War II than on actual combat. The gears of war that have so many young men caught in them move with gradual but inevitable force, and so Everything We Had takes a more thoughtful approach to a historic moment in time.
Connecting with the characters is a gradual process as you get to know the intricacies that make up their individual personalities. This sets the reader up to feel the emotions of the characters as they face an uncertain fate, and throughout the book the author’s clear and methodical research shines with details such as specific views, locations, and—most notably—comprehensive descriptions of the airplanes Jack and Charlie pilot. This allows the reader to become deeply familiar with the motivations of the characters and the capabilities of the airplanes they fly.
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!
In The Brisling Code, a fast-paced first installment of her historical thriller series, Oakley weaves a brilliant portrayal of the perils met by the Norwegian Resistance during WWII.
Layered perspectives—from resistance workers, traitors, and even an SS Officer—create a rich world through which readers can understand the sacrifices that were made to free our world from the tyranny of Nazi Germany.
Immersed in volatile Nazi-occupied Bergen, Norway, fearless young intelligence agent Tore Haugland and his team of organizers work tirelessly to protect the essential work of the Norwegian resistance.
Haugland’s task is to uncover the plans for the expansion of the German Uboat base with inside help at a shipyard. Also charged in unveiling the meaning behind a mysterious message sent by his murdered predecessor, Haugland navigates the treacherous waters of Norway—a mere haunting of the beautiful city it once was before Nazi occupation. Readers can “almost taste the danger” as our hero moves from one treacherous predicament to the next. Haugland’s mission risks not only his own life, but the lives of every friend and connection he makes.
The Brisling Code is a multi-faceted novel, interspersing the harsh and secretive political climate of Nazi occupation with the deaf community’s resistance work in Norway and a 1919 Norwegian program called the Wienerbarnkomitten, in which Norwegian families took in and raised German children whose families were impacted by WWI.
These overlapping communities create a heart of tenderness and relational love at the center of the novel, despite the violence and treachery that constantly threatens to break through.
For example, seemingly cold-hearted SS officer Hans Becker—on the hunt to capture Haugland and responsible for torturing and murdering many resistance workers— experiences a deep tenderness for his Norwegian foster mother, admitting that “She is my mamma. Not of my blood, but my heart.” As a result, he is forced to reconsider the motives behind his actions and stand up for her well-being, risking both his position as an officer and his life.
The Brisling Code is filled with these small, deeply sensitivity moments that bring characters to life.
People show warmth in a freezing world with actions like a cup of hot coffee, an embrace, and a smile of welcome. Despite the constant threat of violent death, life goes on in Norway, creating a web of intricate characters whose lives are rich with hopes, fears, and longings. Similarly, characters often reveal their true selves under their heavily-curated exteriors through actions and allegiances. These complicated moments and relationships refuse cut-and-dry judgements, allowing readers to find humanity in unexpected places.
Undercurrents of political tension in The Brisling Code create a rich historical context that puts readers in the shoes of Norwegians in their occupied homeland.
With descriptions of everyday life, readers soon understand the paranoia and surveillance in Norway— the constant fear of separation and harm among families and friends.
An expertly researched and executed novel, The Brisling Code invites readers to see that unexpected tender moments can always be found, opening up the possibilities for resistance in the face of violence.
This year we celebrate the 125th anniversary of the birth of one of America’s most important authors, Ernest Hemingway.
Born on July 21, 1899 in Oak Park, Illinois, the influential American literary icon changed the style of novel writing by creating prose that was straightforward and concise, while not sacrificing the emotional impact and lyrical prose. Hemingway wrote about important and timely topics, such as war and the bloody sport of bullfighting, in an accessible way without losing the underlying meaning or sacrificing the emotional reaction he strove to activate in his readers. For this reason, he continues to be celebrated today. In honor of his 125th birthday, I’ll connect three of his most famous stories with the real-life events that influenced his writing.
A Farewell to Arms – Exploring the Heart of A Young Man in Love and War
After graduating high school, Hemingway became a reporter for the Kansas City Star in Missouri, and the following year he volunteered as an ambulance driver for the Red Cross in Italy duringWorld War I. He was wounded by mortar fire and spent months recuperating under the care of an English nurse, Agnes von Kurowsky, with whom he fell in love and had affair. She was an older woman who eventually broke Hemingway’s heart when she ended the relationship after he returned to the United States.
In A Farewell to Arms, Hemingway’s fictional character Lt. Frederic Henry falls in love with Catherine Barkley, and their relationship explores the emotional, physical, and spiritual connection Hemingway and van Kurowsky shared during the tumult of World War I.
A Moveable Feast – A Writer’s Life in 1920s Paris
Ernest Hemingway chronicled his early years as a strugglingjournalist and writer in Paris during the 1920s in A Moveable Feast. The work mentions Paris’s legendary bars, cafes, and hotels of the era, and gives insight into his relationships with other notable cultural figures of the “Lost Generation,” such as Sylvia Beach, Aleister Crowley, F. Scott Fitzgerald, Ezra Pound, and Gertrude Stein.
One scene in the book offers a moment of reflection for every writer. His first wife, Hadley Richardson, mistakenly throws out the only copy of a book he’d been working on. It’s a heartbreaking scene, but one that adds to the poignancy of the story.
The Old Man and the Sea – The Death of the Writer’s Soul
After a period of frustrating writers block, Hemingway published what would become his last significant work in 1952. “The Old Man and the Sea,” a novella about an aging fisherman in pursuit of a marlin off the coast of Cuba explores how perseverance and dignity are the “weapons” used to battle through a person’s struggles in life and the theme acts as an allegory of the writer’s own struggles to preserve his art in the face of the fame and attention.
Hemingway struggled to produce a major literary work for more than a decade before the “The Old Man and the Sea” debuted, and despite some critics proclaiming it didn’t hold up next to his earlier works, the book was awarded the Pulitzer Prize in 1953 and won the Nobel Prize for literature in 1954.
We will always remember Hemingway
Oftentimes, Ernest Hemingway’s life is told as a series of amazing adventures, mental and physical suffering, lost loves, and a sad and unfortunate ending. Many would say his life was tragic, but that life provided a deep well of stories that propelled Hemingway to produce some of the most important literature in the American cannon. With the skill of a surgeon, Hemingway relied on lessons gained as a reporter to deliver emotionally impactful storytelling in a clear and concise way that many writers continue to turn to for inspiration and learning.
Happy 125th birthday, Ernest Hemingway!
Interested in exploring the times Hemingway experienced through the storytelling of today’s authors? We encourage you to dig into stories written by Chanticleer’s authors who bring to life the early days of the Twentieth Century with the following books.
Passage Home to Meuse By Gail Noble-Sanderson First Prize Winner in the Chatelaine CIBA Division
It’s 1923 and character Marie Durant Chagall is now 27 years old as she tells about her life-altering events inThe Passage Home to Meuse,thanks to author Gayle Noble-Sanderson. This is the second historical novel in the Meuse Trilogy. The world around Marie is still reeling from the devastation of World War I. She and the other characters in the book are learning how to continue living, and perhaps more importantly, wishing to find joy once again in life.
Marie is at home in France, seeking peace within, as well as for those around her. She looks for ways to help others who are in need, and her nursing skills come in handy to help this farming community. Nearby she’s found a sense of belonging with the Sisters at the Chapel, and her friendships continue with Henri and others.
A War in Too Many Worlds By Elizabeth Crowens
Grand Prize Winner in the Cygnus CIBA Division
Musician-turned-time-traveler John Patrick Scott adds spy and saboteur to his resume while undercover in Germany in the final months of World War I, in A War in Too Many Worlds, the third installment of Elizabeth Crowen’s thrilling sci-fi series, The Time Traveler Professor.
Meanwhile, Scott’s once and future collaborator in psychic experiments, Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, is back in Britain sharing real time-travel adventures with the inventor of the fictional time machine, H.G. Wells.
A Week at Surfside Beach By Pierce Koslosky Jr.
Grand Prize Winner in the Shorts CIBA Division
Vacationers from all walks of life converge on Portofino II-317C, South Carolina, a quaint blue beach house, in Pierce Koslosky Jr.’s short story collection, A Week at Surfside Beach.
From May 30th-December 26th each group of people comes to stay one week at a time, to forget their cares of the big city, to work, to celebrate, or to simply get away. Surfside Beach has much to show them, including temperamental weather.
The small town itself offers a charming supermarket where fishing supplies, whoopie pies, and local southern favorites can be found. The Christmas vacationers, the final of the thirteen beach house renters, struggle to find a tree in time; a real tree simply wouldn’t allow enough space for the family to sleep, and the fake tree would cost too much. But they find arts and crafts supplies in town, to fashion a paper Christmas tree during a day of rainy weather.
In The Sower of Black Field, Katherine Koch’s historical fiction novel, Father Viktor Koch— a 67-year-old Catholic priest— presides over a monastery in a small German village, as the Nazi regime sweeps through the country.
The time is April, 1941. Fr. Viktor’s order, the U.S.-based Passionists, built the monastery eight years prior, providing employment for most of the villagers and remaining a symbol of their faith.
Fr. Viktor has lived in Europe for over 20 years, but balances his love of Germany, its land, its mysticism, with his American roots. He will need all his personal and religious resources over the next four years as the Nazis take hold in the village and, later, the Americans come to “de-Nazify” the town and hold its people responsible for the horrors of the Holocaust.
Thank you for joining us in celebrating America’s literary icon, Ernest Hemingway!
Do you have a book that deserves to be discovered? You can always submit your book for an Editorial Review with Chanticleer!Chanticleer Editorial Review Packages are optimized to maximize your digital footprint. Reviews are one of the most powerful tools available to authors to help sell and market their books. Find out what all the buzz is about here.
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Jerena Tobiasen delivers a sharp, first-rate novel in Tsarina’s Crown, first installment in TheNightingale and Sparrow Chronicles, capturing a precise panorama of Russian politics and British espionage during a delicate period in time.
The year is 1915 and Simon Temple, a young naval officer aboard the RMS Guardian— a British Royal Navy Ship— patrols the North Sea for questionable communications and marine activity. Months later, he is entrusted by the British crown to serve as a liaison on a covert mission in Petrograd, Russia. Simon is careful not to blow his cover as a young aristocrat while he is thrust into the world of international politics, the ruthless Russian Revolution, and becomes caught right in the middle of two powerful royal families.
The mission turns out to be longer than Simon anticipated, and his life quickly becomes threatened as he tries to navigate a dangerous political labyrinth, all the while hoping to unearth the spy information that his King requires of him. But as the precarious wheel of mayhem and chaos churns in Russia, Simon’s only way to survive is to escape, realizing that his wit and intelligence might not save him from the tense political atmosphere. Things become even more complicated when he is joined by two other people who hope to flee.
Told with verve and heart, the plot offers a raw and intimate portrait of events and activities bookended by the First World War.
The tension and suspense are palpable in every chapter as Simon wrestles his way out of one dangerous situation after another.
Tobiasen’s lucid writing and adept storytelling capture the culture and intricate details during one of the biggest social and political upheavals of the twentieth century. She takes us behind palace walls of both Britain and Russia, offering readers a globetrotting experience as we glimpse into the intrigues of the aristocracy amid controversy and fiery protests.
The author does a remarkable job balancing vocabulary and syntax appropriate for this period while using modern language to make her text easily graspable. The meticulous research done before writing this novel is salient in her story and keeps the chronology accurate, a worthy indication of an author in command of her genre.
Love becomes a central theme in the story, giving weight to the characters’ emotions and connections.
An element of romance sparks between Simon and Mary, allowing characters to maneuver not just external conflicts but inner ones as well, pushing them to grow as people. Simon Temple is a character to cheer on, with admirable boldness and determination. The supporting characters are memorable and well-wrought too, adeptly playing their role in moving the story forward.
Tsarina’s Crown: The Nightingale and Sparrow Chronicles is a striking start to a promising series, and one of the best espionage stories in modern historical fiction.
The fight against tyranny grips readers and obsesses authors to this day.
“Soldiers, Sailors and Airmen of the Allied Expeditionary Force!
You are about to embark upon the Great Crusade, toward which we have striven these many months. The eyes of the world are upon you. The hopes and prayers of liberty-loving people everywhere march with you. In company with our brave Allies and brothers-in-arms on other Fronts, you will bring about the destrruction of the German war machine, the elimination of Nazi tyranny over the oppressed peoples of Europe, and security for ourselves in a free world.” — Order of the Day from Supreme Headquarters Allied Expeditionary Force given before the Invasion of Normandy
Chanticleer’s Personal Connection to WWII
At Chanticleer we often take particular care to honor veterans and those who serve.
Kiffer’s father retired after 36 years of service in the Unites States Merchant Marines & Marine Corps where he served in the WWII, Korean War, and the Vietnam War. He died in 1981 from one hundred percent service related injuries.
From left to right we have Kiffer’s brother Tony, her father, and Kiffer herself in Hawaii during the territory days. Her mother, Antha May, is taking the photo
David’s grandfather also served during WWII, stationed in France as a first generation Quebecois transplant in the United States
Robert Gerard Beaumier Sr. who served in WWII
My father would often tell the story of how his grandfather, Robert, was in France during World War II. At one point a dog came and wouldn’t stop barking at his unit, no matter how much they told it to go away. Finally, Robert said “Va t’en!” and immediately the dog ran off. Everyone was suitably impressed that the dog spoke French! — David
The National World War II Museum in New Orleans has an excellent summary of the lead up and importance of D-Day which we recommend you read here.
Most chilling perhaps is the closing of their thoughts that emphasize how important the landing on Normandy was:
The Normandy invasion was one of great turning points of twentieth-century history. An immense army was placed in Nazi-occupied Europe, never to be dislodged. Germany was threatened that same month by a tremendous Soviet invasion from the east that would reach the gates of Berlin by the following April. The way to appreciate D-Day’s importance is to contemplate what would have happened if it had failed. Another landing would not have been possible for at least a year. This would have given Hitler time to strengthen the Atlantic Wall, harass England with the newly developed V-1 flying bombs and V-2 rockets, continue to develop jet aircraft and other so-called “miracle weapons,” and finish off his killing campaign against ethnic and sexual undesirables.
It is our pleasure to share these wonderful WWII books with you from authors who have written about this time.
The JøSSING AFFAIR
By J. L. Oakley
At a time when true identities are carefully protected and information can get you killed, heroes emerge to fight the evils of Nazi-occupied Norway in J.L. Oakley’s highly suspenseful and beautifully penned historical fiction novel, The Jøssing Affair.
In a quiet Norwegian fishing village during the Nazi occupation, risk lurks everywhere. Most residents are patriotic members of the resistance, “jøssings,” but there are “quislings,” too. Those who collaborate with the Germans and tout the Nazi propaganda of Nordic brotherhood between the nations. Mistaking the two is a matter of life and death.
THE SILVER WATERFALL: A Novel of the Battle of Midway
By Kevin Miller
In The Silver Waterfall, author retired U.S. Navy Captain Kevin Miller reveals the intricate and deadly turns of the Battle of Midway, a combat shaped by transforming warfare, and one that would in turn shape the rest of WWII’s Pacific Theater.
After their surprise attack on Pearl Harbor, the Japanese Navy seeks to draw American aircraft carriers into an ambush, to secure Japanese power over the Pacific. In a time of great upheaval for warfare technology, aircraft carriers dominated both sea and sky. So, to destroy the USS Enterprise, Yorktown, and Hornet, Chūichi Nagumo— commander of the Japanese First Air Fleet— brings to bear his own four carriers, HIJMS Akagi, Hiryū, Kaga, and Soryu.
GENERAL in COMMAND – The Life of Major General John B. Anderson
By Michael M. Van Ness
Michael M. Van Ness, the grandson of “the general in command,” has created a remarkable biography chronicling the adventures of a farm boy who rose high rank in the US military and served with distinction in two world wars as a combatant, officer, and sage observer.
Born in 1891, John Benjamin Anderson must have had considerable intelligence as well as patriotism and grit, since he was accepted at West Point Military Academy at age 19, an honor conferred on only 130 applicants per year—and finished in the top third of his class. He would soon serve under General Pershing in the Mexican War, giving him the experience of combat and coincidentally, his first ride in an automobile. That deployment earned him inclusion in Pershing’s ranks in World War I. It was then his diaries began, and though he protested humorously that “I hate to write,” these personal recollections give readers an up-close picture of the devastation of warfare.
COLD PEACE: A Novel of the Berlin Airlift, Part 1
By Helena P. Schrader
Amidst the ruins of Post-WWII, Berlin struggles to rebuild from the ashes, torn apart and facing down the promise of another bloody dictator. A myriad cast, all shaped by that same war, become entwined with the broken city as its hour of need approaches.
Just as Germany is divided between the Americans, British, French, and Soviets, Berlin has been cut into pieces. But the balance of the occupation powers tips eastward as the Soviet Zone surrounds the city, giving them control of all ways into and out of Berlin – save for the air. The occupation currency is worthless thanks to Soviet over-printing, leaving Berlin on a barter system of cigarettes and black-market trading. In order for Germany to recover, the Western Allies plan to introduce a new currency, even if it angers the Soviet bear.
A young boy in Norway makes a discovery while playing with his dog, opening the mystery of EO-N by Dave Mason, a detective story spanning multiple decades and both sides of the Atlantic, a deep dive into the horrors of Nazi Germany, and a heartfelt love story.
A small metal fragment leads to the discovery of a downed WWII twin-engine Mosquito fighter-bomber hidden in snow and glacial ice for nearly 75 years. The crash site yields an initial set of clues, one of which finds its way across the world to Alison Wiley, a biotech CEO in Seattle. Having recently lost her mother, and, a few years earlier, her brother in Afghanistan, she finds her days full of despair, but the discovery makes a distant connection to her long-lost grandfather, and she flies to Norway. There, she meets Scott Wilcox, a Canadian researcher assigned to investigate the discovery after his government learned that the crashed aircraft belonged to the Royal Canadian Air Force. Their attraction is both intellectual and emotional, but the quest to uncover the plane’s mysteries and the fate of Alison’s grandfather place any romance to the side.
In The Sower of Black Field, Katherine Koch’s historical fiction novel, Father Viktor Koch— a 67-year-old Catholic priest— presides over a monastery in a small German village, as the Nazi regime sweeps through the country.
The time is April, 1941. Fr. Viktor’s order, the U.S.-based Passionists, built the monastery eight years prior, providing employment for most of the villagers and remaining a symbol of their faith.
DEAR BOB: Bob Hope’s Wartime Correspondence with the G.I.s of World War II
By Martha Bolton with Linda Hope
During World War II, Bob Hope traveled almost ceaselessly to outposts large and small, entertaining US troops – and inspiring them; Martha Bolton brings the extent of this work to light in Dear Bob.
Writer Martha Bolton worked with and for comedian Bob Hope. Now, with Hope’s daughter Linda, she has gathered and organized the letters written to Bob by the soldiers he helped.
Hope, English born, and born to entertain, once said he could not retire and go fishing because “Fish don’t applaud.” Among his sizzling lines – and there are hundreds recorded here – he told one audience that he’d gotten a wonderful welcome when he arrived at their camp: “I received a 10-gun salute… They told me on the operating table.”
Eighty Years later, and the sacrifices made in WWII still matter and the fight for a more just world continues. Thank you to everyone who has submitted books to us and been a part of our own journey and learning.
The Hemingway Book Awards recognize emerging new talent and outstanding works in the genre of 20th Century Wartime Fiction. The Hemingway Awards is a genre division of Chanticleer International Book Awards and Novel Competitions (The CIBAs).
In The Brisling Code, a fast-paced first installment of her historical thriller series, Oakley weaves a brilliant portrayal of the perils met by the Norwegian Resistance during WWII. 
