Today, during the first meeting of 2014, the Greater Fort Worth Writers handed out annual awards honoring members for the manuscripts written during 2013 and service to the group, as well as highlighting those who made incredible strides in perfecting their craft.
In the spirit of award season, let’s crack open a few envelopes and dole out some awards …
Winner of the New Adult Fiction of the Year is Susan Welch!
Annually, we participate in a Round Robin writing exercise. In 2013, Matthew Bryant started us with a dystopian sci-fi story, The Ultima Storm, and Jennifer Bennett’s contribution was especially outstanding. Congratulations Jennifer for the Round Robin Submission Award!
Scot Morgan receives Best Sci-Fi Award from Jeff Bacot
GFWW President Jeff Bacot received the Outstanding Blog Post award for his blog, The Story of You.
The award for Best Science Fiction manuscript goes to Scot Morgan for his newly released novel, Adamar.
Bethany Spotts received the award for Young Adult manuscript for her novel Help, My Dad is Missing.
Susie Sheehey receives the Romance Award for Prince of Solana
Susan Sheehey’s romantic suspense manuscript, Prince of Solana, received the 2013 Romance Award.
Kimberly Packard (yours truly) received the General Fiction award for her follow up to Phoenix, Pardon Falls.
Jeff Bacot’s award-winning novel, On the Hole, can add another strike to the scorecard with the GFWW award for Sports Fiction.
No selfies allowed. In public at least. Kim awards Jeff for Sports Fiction for On the Hole
This next award goes to a very special writer and member of GFWW. Ted Rork continues
We love you Ted!
to grow in leaps and bounds in his craft, sometimes enduring tough love. Because Ted “takes a licking, but keeps on ticking,” we awarded him the Timex Award for his hard-work and good-spirits during critique sessions.
Susan Sheehey was awarded the President’s Award for outstanding writer critiques, editing suggestions, group involvement and benevolent service. Susie really truly goes above and beyond with each writer in the group. And we love her dearly!
Matthew … where is your other hand, dude?
Book of the Year goes to Matthew Bryant for his awe-inspiring follow up to Towers, Impulse. We can’t wait for you guys to read this adrenalin-filled ride!
And … drum roll …
The Writer of Year goes to an author whose dedication to the craft resulted in not one, but two books released in 2013 (Sword’s Call and Collision Force!), and we’ve lost count of how many other manuscripts she’s written. Let’s just say that Chrissy Szarek is known as the group overachiever, but we all inspire to her productivity and talent. Congrats, Chrissy!
Writer of the Year, C.A. Szarek, with Jeff Bacot
While the music swells and the credits roll, I have to tell you that being a part of a community of writers like GFWW is such an integral part to the journey. Not only do you find camaraderie and support, but you learn so much from each other. I’m not just advocating our group (even though we do rock), any critique group that gels like we do offer immense benefit. If you can’t join us, please find a group that works for you.
Stay tuned for a letter from our esteemed president. To join us in 2014, visit our Meetup page for meeting dates.
Keep writing!
Kim
