Announcing the 2021 Foreword Indies Winners

2021 Foreword INDIES Winners collage

TRAVERSE CITY, Michigan: June 16, 2022—Foreword Reviews announced the winners of its INDIES Book of the Year Awards today. The awards recognize the best books published in 2021 from small, independent, and university presses, including university and author publishers. You can view a list of the winners here.

“This annual exercise in Indie excellence continues to surprise us both qualitatively and quantitatively—which makes the judging process for our editors that much more difficult because there are so many books deserving recognition,” says Matt Sutherland, Foreword‘s Executive Editor. “You can be certain that this year’s lineup of medal winners will thrill all readers.”

“The resilience and adaptability of independent publishing continue to inspire us in our mission here at Foreword,” says Danielle Ballantyne, Managing Editor of Foreword Reviews. “We are so grateful to the librarians and booksellers who volunteer their time to judge the INDIES entries so that we can give this special recognition to the independent authors and publishers going above and beyond.”

For this year’s competition, over 2,700 entries were submitted in 55 categories, with Foreword’s editors choosing approximately 10 finalists per genre. Those finalists were then delivered to individual librarians and booksellers tasked with picking the Gold, Silver, Bronze, and Honorable Mention winners.

Foreword editors also selected Editor’s Choice Prize winners in nonfiction and fiction. Nazaré, a PM Press title by JJ Amaworo Wilson, was named the fiction honoree; and A Salad Only A Devil Would Eat—by Charles Hood, Heyday Books—was honored as the winner in nonfiction.

Foreword’s 2021 Independent Publisher of the Year is Regal House Publishing. At not even a decade old, Regal House has already managed to carve out a notable space for itself in independent literature. Motivated by a desire to see quality literary works succeed in a tough marketplace, Jaynie Royal founded the press in 2014, and she has been stunning audiences with a diverse selection of novels, memoirs, and poetic works ever since. 2021 saw the release of several dazzling books from Regal House, including The Femme Fatale Hypothesis, an edge-of-your-seat psychological thriller set within a complicated adult relationship. With each new release, Regal House continues to generate excitement and suspense regarding what thrilling titles it will introduce next.

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About Foreword: Since 1998, Foreword Reviews has provided trade book reviews of the best titles from independent presses. In print, and online, its FOLIO award-winning design and editorial content makes the magazine a favorite among librarians, booksellers, and readers—an excellent resource when it comes to purchasing books. Foreword INDIES and the fee-for-review Clarion service complement our online content and print magazine, helping to showcase independent presses and their authors for over 24 years.

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