BREAKING NEWS: INDIES Book of the Year Winners for 2023 - Foreword This Week
Today, this humble newsletter has been given the massive honor of announcing the INDIES winners for 2023. We feel so chuffed because Foreword takes this awards program very, very seriously. Our judging process is what separates the INDIES from other book awards programs—twelve finalists in each category chosen by Foreword’s editorial team, and winners (Gold, Silver, Bronze) picked by teams of more than sixty librarians and booksellers. Can you think of any book industry professionals better qualified to identify great independently published books?
So, let’s get on with it.
See the complete list of winners for the 2023 INDIES Book of the Year Awards
The INDIES Editor’s Choice Prize for Fiction Goes to The Simple Art of Killing a Woman, by Patricia Melo, Restless Books
A Brazilian lawyer is reminded that intimacy is perilous in Patrícia Melo’s searing novel The Simple Art of Killing a Woman. While researching fatal crimes against women, a lawyer lists the varying slights that caused men to kill their partners, daughters, and neighbors: they were full of themselves, they disobeyed, they chose the wrong outfits. There were unapproved looks at parties; there were career advances that made their husbands feel lesser. 2023 INDIES Winners
The INDIES Editor’s Choice Prize for Nonfiction Goes to Ephemera, by Briana Loewinsohn, Fantagraphics
A botany-themed meditation on memory, absence, and loss, Ephemera is a beautiful graphic memoir.
Returning to her childhood home, Briana Loewinsohn seeks to restore the gardens and plants that had dried up and became overgrown. Through the process, she remembers her childhood and her mother. In a series of extended flashbacks, her mother’s strange behavior and prolonged absences are shown; in the present, Loewinsohn attempts to reconcile herself to this past. 2023 INDIES Winners
The INDIES Publisher of the Year is CamCat Books
CamCat Books is a mere five years old, but you wouldn’t know it from the significant impact they’ve already had on independent publishing. Their books are awards show darlings thanks to their mix of exciting storylines, dynamic authors, and impeccable packaging—the sort of titles that catch eyes on bookstore and library shelves before they captivate readers’ imaginations. 2023 INDIES Winners
Barbara Hodge
