Posted on July 1, 2018 at 12:00 PM by Guest Author

Today's guest post comes from Edward Trayer, organizer of The Wishing Shelf Book Awards.

Book awards: Fun to run?

Five years ago, I set up The Wishing Shelf Book Awards. Why? Well, I was upset with book awards open to self-published and independently published authors. I felt they were a total rip-off.

I remember, I was a finalist in one America-based award —  I was so excited — and they didn’t even bother to tell me.

Then, in another award (also America-based), I did very, VERY well but all they were interested in was selling me dodgy winner stickers at a crazy, inflated price.

Then there was the feedback I got from a third award I entered. It was a joke! It was nineteen (yes, nineteen!) words long and congratulated me on writing a wonderful adult book set in war-time France.

IT WAS A CHILDREN’S BOOK SET IN A MAGIC BOOKSHOP!      

So I went for a walk and decided in amongst the tall chestnut trees to set up my own book award. And that, my fellow authors, is what I did.  

But it had to be different. Much, much different to what was on offer at present. So I thought to myself, “What do I want from a book award?”

Well, I want the organizers to see me, actually see me — and my book. I don’t just want to be a dollar sign or a pound sign to them.

Also, I want to get value for money so, even if I don’t win, I want to get feedback from the judging.

And, finally, I don’t want to pay lots of money to enter. So, from this, I set up The Wishing Shelf Book Awards.  

Over the last seven years, it has grown. Wow! How it’s grown.

In the first year, we had forty-two authors and publishers enter. This year it will be closer to three hundred!

Now we have a very interactive Facebook page where the authors and publishers can discuss the award and how best to run it.

Now we provide the authors who enter a catchy quote to help them to market their books.

Now we post reviews — based on the feedback — on Amazon and Goodreads.

Now we actively support Blind Children UK, helping them to produce books for children with sight problems.

Now we have over twenty schools and two adult reading groups (one in London, one in Stockholm, a total of sixty-two adult readers) helping us to judge the books.

Now we send authors who enter feedback of between four hundred and fifteen hundred words based on the readers’ comments. They look at the cover, the content, the editing, and the style.

We even provide the authors with statistics, e.g., how many of the readers would read another book by this author, how many of the readers felt the cover was strong, etc. And the prize list for the finalists and winners is pretty impressive too.  

So now, my tiny award is a bit of a monster and is taking more and more of my time. Is it fun? Yes, most of the time it is.

And that’s important as the award is not run for profit and every penny of the entry fee is spent on running the award and helping to support Blind Children UK.

In fact, most of the time it is very rewarding, and our reputation on and off the web is “glowing.”

Don’t get me wrong. We do mess up. Two years ago, for example, it took too long to get all the feedback to the authors. So, this year, I’m employing help.

The Wishing Shelf Awards actually has a member of staff! An ex-primary school head teacher who will help me to correlate all the feedbacks. It’s all very exciting.

But do you know what the best bit is? Twice now, one of the US-based awards I hate has attempted to buy my small awards.

And I can’t tell you how much I enjoyed telling them to go to…well, you know where. Now THAT was fun!

About the author

Edward Trayer, under the pen name Billy Bob Buttons, is the author of thirteen children’s books including the UK People’s Book Prize winner I Think I Murdered Miss. He is also the organizer of The Wishing Shelf Book Awards.

You can read more about him here.

Categories: Behind the scenes

Tagged As: Awards, Guest writer

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