Author: Suzanne Roche Can 21st-century molecular biology answer age-old questions about the human experience? It all begins when nine-year old, Max, finds a relic in an antique store that magically transports him, along with his brother and stepsister into the past.
H.A.L.F.: The Deep BeneathRunner-up
2015 Beach Book Festival
Author: Natalie Wright H.A.L.F. 9 has taken his first breath of desert air and his first steps in the human world. Created to be a weapon, he proved too powerful for his makers, hidden from humans and sedated. But H.A.L.F. 9 has escaped the underground lab he called home, and the sedation has worn off….
Sheppard of the ArgonneRunner-up
2015 Beach Book Festival
Author: G. William Weatherly Sheppard of the Argonne follows Captain Sheppard McCloud, wounded hero of Pearl Harbor, in command of the battle cruiser Argonne during the fictitious opening phases of World War II as he battles submarines, aircraft, surface ships and the demons of post-traumatic stress. The novel provides rare insight into wartime leadership.
Sunny KincaidHonorable mention
2015 San Francisco Book Festival
Penelope Kahler Swan Sunny Kincaid, a country cop with a dog named Big for a partner, has a long dead husband who just won’t leave her alone.
Libellus de NumerosHonorable mention
2015 San Francisco Book Festival
Jim West Alex gets transported to a strange world where Latin and Math combine with magical effects. To get back home, she will need the help of the greatest mathematician of all time, Archimedes. In a world where math is magic, Alex wished she paid more attention in math class.
Banana Chronicles: Fishing for Bananas Runner-up
2015 Amsterdam Book Festival
Author: Timothy Brower Banana Chronicles: Fishing for Bananas by Timothy Brower is a delightful and creative children’s pictorial and early reader book, introducing its young reading audience to the concepts of fairness and accountability. Within the story, the main character – Monkey – trades the fish he catches each day for items he needs to…
For a Fee of 2 Shillings Honorable mention
2015 Amsterdam Book Festival
Author: Faye Whittaker Fate weaves its tricky threadsamongst the garment of intrigue and mysteryshrouding Miri, a beautiful young Maori woman. Her attempt to materialize her childhood obsession andfantasy to be other than she is, only serves tocreate a mantle of despair to hover over her life.
The New IndiansHonorable mention
2015 San Francisco Book Festival
Joe Jessup There is a new war being waged in the New West. In this gripping contemporary Western tale, a small town clashes with environmentalists over a changing landscape as an aging cowboy attempts to find the place his Lakota grandfather once called the middle ground.
Near Somewhere Honorable mention
2015 Paris Book Festival
Author: Edward Cozza Actors, bartenders, doctors, musicians, writers, winemakers, & cads. Southern California,New York City. Connections with complications. Foreword by Chef Dean Fearing. Winner-Beverly Hills Book Awards-New Fiction.
Singular Acts of EndearmentHonorable mention
2015 San Francisco Book Festival
Author: Desmond Kon Zhicheng-Mingdé Singular Acts of Endearment is an epistolary novel, Jasmine Lee-Heschel’s correspondence dipping into ideas of illness and mortality, nature and literature, and all kinds of love from the edifying, tentative, furtive to ruinous. Described by Valerie Sayers as “utterly engrossing”, Frank Stewart has called it “narrative by a true storyteller”.