Finalist in the San Diego Book Awards

4:43 PM PDT, May 6, 2008

I am pleased to announce that my People In the News: J.K. Rowling has been named as a finalist in the young adult nonfiction category of the San Diego Book Awards.

In the interest of full disclosure, I should mention that I am the president of the San Diego Book Awards Association, Inc. The organization's bylaws allow its officers and board members to enter the awards, provided they do not participate in the judging. In addition to honoring local authors, the organization sponsors Read-4-Fun, a program that promotes literacy among fifth-grade students countywide through a joint effort with elementary school librarians.

Only books by San Diego County authors are eligible for the awards, yet the competition is always stiff. After all, San Diego County is the third largest county in the United States by population. With 2,941,454 residents, it is more populous than twenty states.

Last year's winner in the biography category, Judith Pinkerton Josephson, is back with a biography of Louis Armstrong. Two of her 2006 books—Ludwig van Beethoven and Walt Disney—not only were finalists, but they tied for first place. It was the first time in the thirteen-year history of the awards that two books by the same author tied for a win. My entry last year, Ibn al-Haytham: First Scientist, was not a finalist. I was disappointed, but not shocked. I have entered seventeen books in the San Diego Book Awards since 1996; five have been named finalists, but twelve have not. Giants was my only win, and I felt very fortunate to receive the award that year.

The other two finalists in the young adult category this year are Zombies by Cynthia Jenson-Elliott and Cloning by Tina Kafka, winner of the 2004 San Diego Book Award for young adult nonfiction. Zombies, published by Kidhaven Press, is in the same Monsters series as my Giants. I have not had the pleasure of reading Cloning, but I did have a chance to read Zombies. I was deeply impressed. I know how hard it is to write such a tightly formatted book, and Jenson-Elliott did a fantastic job. She took the kinds of risks I seldom do when writing nonfiction, using metaphors and similes. For example, she wrote that the flesh of the zombies resembles "moldy cheese or rotten meat"— images sure to horrify and delight young readers. She did a great job explaining the science behind reputed recipes for turning people into zombies, and she thoughtfully explored why zombies hold a fascination for so many people.

My friend and fellow board member M. Robert Grunwald entered his manuscript, A Cat Named Turtle, in the unpublished young adult novel category this year. I had the pleasure of reading the first thirty pages of his work and found it artistically ambitious and wonderfully entertaining. Telling a story from the point of view of a cat is a daring thing to try, yet he pulled it off convincingly and gracefully. Turtle's take on the world of humans made me laugh out loud several times. I am surprised the manuscript is not a finalist.

Many fine works must and do go unrecognized. A few years ago, a book by a well-known San Diego author was a Book-of-the-Month Club selection yet was not chosen to be a finalist in the San Diego Book Awards. It is all up to the judges. Each entry is read by a panel of three judges who, prompted by thoughtfully prepared questionnaires, score the books using a point system. Every attempt is made to be fair and objective, but ultimately the results reflect the personal tastes and interests of the judges. It cannot be otherwise, of course.

The track record of the judges is pretty good, though. The winners of the Theodor S. Geisel Award for the "best in show" among all the category winners reads like a who's who of San Diego authors, including Susan Vreeland (three times), Daniel Reveles, Kathi Diamant, Steve Kowit, Jennifer Brennan, Lee Silber, and Mark Clements. Other renowned San Diego authors such as Richard Lederer, Ken Kuhlken, Jennifer Coburn, and Chet Cunningham also have won San Diego Book Awards.

Martha Barnette, co-host of public radio's "A Way with Words," will host this year's awards ceremony. I can't wait to see who is honored this year.

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