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Inaugural Indiana Authors Award Recipients Named

Regional and Emerging Authors join nationally acclaimed author James Alexander Thom in receiving Library Foundation award

INDIANAPOLIS --- Three authors with ties to Indiana have been awarded the inaugural Eugene and Marilyn Glick Indiana Authors Award at a gala awards dinner on September 26 at the Central Library in downtown Indianapolis. Indiana native James Alexander Thom was presented the national award while Susan Neville received the Regional Author award and Christine Montross received the Emerging Author award.

Nominations were submitted from across the state in early spring. Any published writer who was born in Indiana or has lived in Indiana for at least five years was eligible. A seven-member, statewide Award Panel selected the winners and finalists in three categories from the pool of publicly nominated authors:

National Author - $10,000 prize: a writer with Indiana ties, but whose work is known and read throughout the country. National authors were evaluated on their entire body of work. Winner: James Alexander Thom; Finalists: Scott Russell Sanders and Margaret McMullan
Regional Author - $7,500 prize: A writer who is well-known and respected throughout the state of Indiana. Regional authors were evaluated on their entire body of work. Winner: Susan Neville; Finalists: Jared Carter and James H. Madison
Emerging Author - $5,000 prize: A writer with only one published book. Emerging authors were evaluated on their single published work. Winner: Christine Montross; Finalists: Kathleen Hughes and Greg Schwipps

This new award recognizes the contributions of Indiana authors to the literary landscape in Indiana and across the nation by the Indianapolis-Marion County Public Library Foundation, and is funded by the generosity of The Glick Fund, a fund of Central Indiana Community Foundation.

“This was a rare and heart-lifting pleasure,” said James Alexander Thom. “What a great night to share the stage with Ms. Neville and Ms. Montross whose works will be so acknowledged in the years to come.”

“I am very honored to be named along with Jared Carter and James Madison, writers I so admire, in the regional category,” said Susan Neville. “In my teaching and reading life, I am grateful for writers who have dedicated their talent to a particular place and recorded what might have gone unrecorded or unseen or once seen and then forgotten.”

Christine Montross added, “It is an extraordinary honor to be named the winner of the Emerging Author Category of the Indiana Authors Award. I am so grateful to Eugene and Marilyn Glick for establishing this generous award, which will both recognize existing Hoosier writers and encourage future literary talent in the state. It is a great and humbling pleasure to be recognized for doing a job one loves to do; and it is particularly meaningful to me to have been singled out from such an accomplished group of contestants."

Information about nominating an author for the 2010 Eugene and Marilyn Glick Indiana Authors Award will be made available early next year. To learn more, contact the Library Foundation at (317) 275-4700 or visit www.indianaauthorsaward.org.

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About The Glick Fund: Eugene and Marilyn Glick are two of the most generous philanthropists in Indiana. In addition to establishing the Indiana Authors Award with the Indianapolis-Marion County Public Library Foundation, Glick charitable funds have invested substantially in Indiana educational institutions, arts organizations, hospitals and the Pro-100 program, a leadership program for underprivileged youth. Recent grant recipients include the Indiana Historical Society Living History Center, the Indianapolis Cultural Trail and the Glick Eye Institute at the Indiana University School of Medicine.

About the Library Foundation: The Indianapolis-Marion County Public Library Foundation supports and enhances programs, services, and facilities of the Indianapolis-Marion County Public Library, and its partnerships in lifelong learning initiatives that benefit a diverse community. Through advocacy, fundraising and stewardship, the Library Foundation supports numerous Library initiatives to enhance patrons’ lives, including early literacy programs, homework assistance, workforce development and technologies, including a variety of online library resources. The Foundation works to support these initiatives, making educational opportunities available free-of-charge to all Library patrons.

National Author Winner

James Alexander Thom

A Gosport, Indiana native, Thom has been writing historical fiction in Indiana since the 1970s. His successful career as a novelist has taken him from the pages of the Indianapolis Star to the Saturday Evening Post to the Indiana University School of Journalism. Known for the depth of research he puts in to his novels, Thom has traveled the state and the country gathering information and experiences to help him accurately portray his subjects. One of Indiana’s best known contemporary authors, Thom’s body of work includes Follow the River, Long Knife, From Sea to Shining Sea, and Panther in the Sky. His award-winning writing represents some of the best Indiana has to offer.

More information is available at www.jamesalexanderthom.com.

National Author Finalists

Scott Russell Sanders

Sanders is the author of more than 20 books including novels, nonfiction and collections of short stories. His writing has been widely recognized, earning him a number of state and national awards, including a Pulitzer Prize nomination for his most recent novel, A Private History of Awe. Originating from Memphis, Tennessee, Sanders currently resides in Bloomington, Indiana, where he has been an English professor at Indiana University since he completed his Ph.D. at the University of Cambridge in 1971. Sanders’ most recent book, A Conservationist Manifesto, explores questions of environmental sustainability, and the cultural changes necessary to get us there.

More information is available at www.scottrussellsanders.com.

Margaret McMullan

McMullan’s writing has garnered a number of literary awards and other accolades while her essays and short stories have been published in a variety of magazines, newspapers, and journals. McMullan is chair of the English department at the University of Evansville and the author of five young adult novels, including In My Mother's House, Cashay and When I Crossed No-Bob. After spending her childhood in Newton County, Mississippi and living in Chicago, Illinois, McMullan pursued religious studies at Grinnell College and received her MFA in fiction from the University of Arkansas, Fayetteville. Currently, McMullan is working on a collection of stories and a new young adult novel.

More information is available at http://www.margaretmcmullan.com.

Regional Author Winner

Susan Neville

Neville is an Indianapolis native and author of many works of short fiction and creative nonfiction. In addition, her stories have been included in a number of anthologies. Her book, In the House of Blue Lights, won her the Richard Sullivan Prize for Short Fiction, while Invention of Flight won the Flannery O’Connor Award for Short Fiction. Neville received her undergraduate degree from DePauw University and earned her MFA at Bowling Green State University. She is currently an English professor at Butler University where she also serves as Butler’s Demia chair.

More information is available at http://www.susan-neville.com.

Regional Author Finalists

Jared Carter

An Indiana poet, Carter has received wide recognition for his writing. After gaining his education at Yale University and Goddard College, Carter worked in textbook publishing, education, and journalism before his first book of poems was published in 1981, launching his writing career. Work, for the Night Is Coming earned Carter a number of awards and fellowships including the Walt Whitman Award, a Guggenheim, and two grants from the National Endowment for the Arts. Nearly 30 years since his first book, Carter has published three more books of poetry and continues to live and write in Indiana.

More information is available at http://www.jaredcarter.com.

James H. Madison

Madison writes nonfiction works focused on the history of Indiana in the 20th century. With a special insight that only a native Hoosier could possess, Madison has explored the history of Indiana’s culture, traditions and some of its most well-known people. His books include The Indiana Way: A State History; Eli Lilly: A Life, 1885-1977; and A Lynching in the Heartland: Race and Memory in America. Madison is currently the Thomas and Kathryn Miller Professor of History at Indiana University, and in addition to writing several books has served as editor for the Indiana Magazine of History since 1976.

More information is available at http://www.indiana.edu/~histweb/faculty/madison.shtml.

Emerging Author Winner

Christine Montross

Montross, an Indianapolis native, received her undergraduate degree in English and her MFA in creative writing at the University of Michigan. She taught high school English for a short time before deciding to pursue medicine at Brown University. It was during her first year as a medical student that she found the inspiration for her first book in the dissection and study of a human body. Body of Work is an intersection of Montross’ interests in literature and medicine and a personal reflection on the dissection process.

Emerging Author Finalists

Kathleen Hughes

Born and raised in Indianapolis, Hughes began writing in high school and was a Prelude Awards finalist in fiction the year she graduated from Lawrence Central. She studied English at Yale University and later received her MFA at the Iowa Writers’ Workshop. Her first novel, Dear Mrs. Lindbergh, reflects her Midwestern origins in its setting, and was inspired by the time she spent as a child on her family’s farm in Cloverdale, Indiana. Hughes currently lives with her family in Rhode Island, but continues to identify herself as a Hoosier.

Greg Schwipps

Schwipps’ background has had a lasting impact on his life and his writing. Born and raised on a working farm in the small town of Milan, Indiana, Schwipps later published a number of articles in outdoor magazines before his first novel, What This River Keeps, was published in 2009. Schwipps’ novel deals with the strong connection people develop with their land and the often painful struggle of losing that land through eminent domain. Schwipps earned his undergraduate degree at DePauw University and his MFA at Southern Illinois University Carbondale. Currently, he is an assistant professor of English at DePauw University.