(1888PressRelease)
March 27, 2006 - Having already garnered praise from many notable sources, including the likes of well-known fantasy author Piers Anthony, Phoenix Tales: Stories of Death & Life by Gregory Bernard Banks has been named a finalist in ForeWord Magazine’s Book of the Year Award for 2005. The Award was established to bring increased attention from librarians and booksellers to the literary achievements of independent publishers and their authors. A jury of librarians, booksellers and reviewers are selected to judge the categories for each entry, who then select the winners and finalists based upon editorial excellence and professional production, as well as the originality of the narrative and the value the book adds to its genre.
Banks’ short story collection was chosen from a field of 1,540 submissions by an editorial team of judges who narrowed the field to 604 finalists in 55 categories. The winners for the Gold, Silver and Bronze prizes in each category, as well as the Editor’s prize winners in both fiction and nonfiction, will be determined by ForeWord’s readership of booksellers and librarians, and will be announced Friday, May 19th, at a special program at BookExpo America in Washington, D.C.
Banks says that he’s “excited and honored” to be nominated. “I always felt I had a good chance of making the finals, so it’s unbelievable to have one’s dream actually come true.”
The collection has also recently received glowing comments from The Writers Digest Self-Published Book Awards judges, saying that “…the writer is extremely talented and the stories are all fun to read and in many cases, thought-provoking.”
Banks is co-Webmaster for the Speculative Literature Foundation (www.SpeculativeLiterature.org/), and is both a Community Leader and freelance graphic designer at Lulu.com. He’s also a frequent contributor to Audacity Magazine (AudacityMagazine.com) with his column, “A Sedentary View”.
Phoenix Tales: Stories of Death & Life is available directly from printer/distributor Lulu Press (www.Lulu.com), as well as from most major bookstores worldwide. Phoenix Tales is also available in ebook format exclusively from StoneGarden.net (
www.StoneGarden.net).
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