Texas authors shine in this roundup of awards and accolades from across the literary world. We’re shouting praise from the rooftops for the vibrant Texas literary community.
Author Awards and Accolades
2024 Will Rogers Medallion Award Winners:
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Teresa H. Janssen – Gold, Western Modern Fiction, The Ways of Water
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K.S. Jones – Gold, Western Romance, Tastefully Texas
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Preston Lewis – Bronze, Western Humor, Call of the Wilde
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Reavis Z. Wortham – Bronze, Western Mystery, Hard Country
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Sequoyah Branham – Bronze, Western Inspirational, In the Company of Cows
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Thomas Goodman – Gold, Western Maverick, The Last Man: A Novel of the 1927 Santa Claus Bank Robbery
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Richard Selcer – Bronze, Western Young Reader/Nonfiction, Fort Worth, Texas: That’s My Town!
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Chris Mullen – Silver, Western Young Reader/Fiction, Rowdy: Rescue and Rowdy: Return (tie)
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S.J. Dahlstrom – Bronze, Western Young Reader/Fiction, Heartwood Mountain
Mary Alford
First place, Short Romantic Mystery/Suspense category, 2024 Daphne du Maurier Award for Excellence in Mystery/Suspense for Don’t Close Your Eyes.
Katherine Center
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Named to Barnes & Noble’s Best Books of 2024 list for The Rom-Commers.
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Finalist in Amazon Editors’ Best Books of 2024 in the Romance category for The Rom-Commers.
Vanetta Chapman
First place, Mainstream Mystery/Suspense category, 2024 Daphne du Maurier Award for Against All Enemies.
Elizabeth Crook
Winner of the 2024 Texas Medal of Arts in Literary Arts, presented by the Texas Cultural Trust.
James Dennis
Silver medal, Contemporary Poetry category, 21st Annual Best Book Awards by American Book Fest, and finalist in the Religious Poetry category for Songs of Seven Days.
Raúl Herrera
Silver medal, Creative Nonfiction category, 2024 Military Writers Society of America awards for Capturing Skunk Alpha.
Nicolás Kanellos
Recipient of the 2023 National Humanities Medal, awarded by President Biden, for his work in founding Arte Público Press
Abigail Owen
Featured on Indigo’s Top 100 Best Books of 2024 list for The Games Gods Play.
Naomi Shihab Nye
- Winner of the $100,000 Wallace Stevens Award for lifetime achievement in poetry from the Academy of American Poets.
- Recipient of the Texas Writer Award at the 2024 Texas Book Festival.
Marie W. Watts
First place, Women’s Fiction category, 2024 Pencraft Awards, for Tough Trail Home.
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James Aalan Bernsen, first place for The Lost War of Texas
- Father Robert Wright, second place for Indigenous Autonomy at La Junta de los Rios
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Art Martinez de Vara, third place for Beneath Sacred Ground
Award Finalists
Suzanne Gene Courtney
Finalist, Biography: Historical category, National Indie Excellence Awards, for Child of Many.
Thomas Ray Garcia
Finalist, Best Collection of Short Stories–English category, International Latino Book Awards, for The River Runs.
Ian Griffin
Finalist, Romance category, 13th Annual Kindle Book Awards, for Trash Can Terry.
Fady Joudah
Finalist, 2024 National Book Awards for Poetry.
Jerome Pumphrey and Jarrett Pumphrey
Finalists for the Kirkus Prize, Young Readers’ Literature/Picture Book category, for There Was a Party for Langston (with author Jason Reynolds).
Jan Sikes
Longlisted for the 2024 Page Turner Book Award for A Beggar’s Bargain.
Cynthia Leitich Smith
Nominated for the 2025 Astrid Lindgren Memorial Award.
Deepa Varadarajan
Longlisted for the $5,000 Crook’s Corner Book Prize for Late Bloomers.
Ledia Xhoga
Shortlisted for the $15,000 Center for Fiction First Novel Prize for Misinterpretation.
She Reads Book Awards Finalists:
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Malas by Marcela Fuentes – Debut
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The Rom-Commers by Katherine Center – Romance
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The Games Gods Play by Abigail Owen – Romantasy
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The Witches of El Paso by Luis Jarmillo – Fantasy & Magical Realism
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House of Bone and Rain by Gabino Iglesias – Horror
