Amazon and Penguin Group (USA) Name Alan Averill and Regina Sirois Winners of 2012 Amazon Breakthrough Novel Award Contest Averill, author of "The Beautiful Land," and Sirois, author of "On Little Wings," receive publishing contracts and a $15,000 advance from Penguin Group (USA)
SEATTLE & NEW YORK – June 16, 2012 – Amazon.com customers around the world cast their votes and this evening, Amazon.com, Penguin Group (USA) and CreateSpace announced the winners of this year's Amazon Breakthrough Novel Award (ABNA) at a special ceremony held at The Olympic Sculpture Park in Seattle. Alan Averill is the Grand Prize winner in the general fiction category for his novel, "The Beautiful Land," while Regina Sirois was awarded the Grand Prize in the young adult fiction group for her novel, "On Little Wings." Both authors have received a publishing contract from Penguin Group (USA) that includes a $15,000 advance. "The Beautiful Land" and "On Little Wings" will be published by Berkley Books and Viking Books for Young Readers, respectively. The novels are now available for pre-order on Amazon.com at www.amazon.com/abna.
This year's competition drew thousands of submissions from aspiring writers around the world – the most entries in the history of the contest. Through several rounds of judging, six finalists rose to the top. An expert panel of authors, agents and editors weighed in with comments on the finalists' work, and in the end, Amazon.com customers voted to select the winners.
"Today's winners were chosen by Amazon.com customers, which is one thing that makes ABNA so special," said Nader Kabbani, Director of Independent Publishing at Amazon. "This contest not only recognizes talented authors but also connects them directly with readers looking to discover great new writers. We congratulate Alan and Regina, whose work clearly resonated with customers."
Tim McCall, Penguin Group (USA) Vice President of Online Sales and Marketing said, "Penguin is always looking for talented new writers to bring to our readers. We were thrilled to see the many promising manuscripts entered in this year's competition by writers who aspire to be published by Penguin. We look forward to publishing Alan's and Regina's novels."
Hailing from Seattle, Alan Averill, a former "video game script doctor," wrote a draft of "The Beautiful Land" as a part of National Novel Writing Month (NaNoWriMo), a movement that challenges writers to complete a novel in 30 days. "The Beautiful Land" is a story of two people in love from the moment they met but destined to be apart forever. Thanks to a time machine and a mysterious invention buried deep in the Australian Outback, they now have one more chance to get it right. One customer reviewer writes: "From the opening statement to the last quote, [it] had me excited all the way through. The prose is strong, descriptive in a quirky way, charming, and unique. The characters are extremely memorable. I can't wait to read how they will be interacting with one another later in the story."
Regina Sirois was born and raised outside of Kansas City. She minored in Creative Writing, but never found the right inspiration for a story until she became the mother of two girls. "On Little Wings" is her first novel. In it, 16-year-old Jennifer's discovery of an aunt she never knew existed reunites her family and provokes love and forgiveness. One customer reviewer writes: "…some of the most exquisite writing I've seen in a VERY long time. Any given sentence, paragraph or scene was sublime."
Now in its fifth year, the Amazon Breakthrough Novel Award contest is an international contest co-sponsored by Amazon.com, Penguin Group (USA) and CreateSpace. For the Amazon Breakthrough Novel Award Contest Official Rules, to view the winning excerpts and reviews, or pre-order the novels, please visit www.amazon.com/abna.
About Amazon.com
Amazon.com, Inc.
(NASDAQ: AMZN), a Fortune 500 company based in Seattle, opened on
the World Wide Web in July 1995 and today offers Earth's Biggest
Selection. Amazon.com, Inc. seeks to be Earth's most
customer-centric company, where customers can find and discover
anything they might want to buy online, and endeavors to offer its
customers the lowest possible prices. Amazon.com and other sellers
offer millions of unique new, refurbished and used items in
categories such as Books; Movies, Music & Games; Digital Downloads;
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Apparel, Shoes & Jewelry; Health & Beauty; Sports & Outdoors; and
Tools, Auto & Industrial. Amazon Web Services provides Amazon's
developer customers with access to in-the-cloud infrastructure
services based on Amazon's own back-end technology platform, which
developers can use to enable virtually any type of business. The new
latest generation Kindle is the lightest, most compact Kindle ever
and features the same 6-inch, most advanced electronic ink display
that reads like real paper even in bright sunlight. Kindle Touch is
a new addition to the Kindle family with an easy-to-use touch
screen that makes it easier than ever to turn pages, search,
shop, and take notes – still with all the benefits of the most
advanced electronic ink display. Kindle Touch 3G is the top of
the line e-reader and offers the same new design and features of
Kindle Touch, with the unparalleled added convenience of free 3G.
Kindle Fire is the Kindle for movies, TV shows, music, books,
magazines, apps, games and web browsing with all the content,
free storage in the Amazon Cloud, Whispersync, Amazon Silk
(Amazon's new revolutionary cloud-accelerated web browser),
vibrant color touch screen, and powerful dual-core processor.
Amazon and its affiliates operate websites, including www.amazon.com, www.amazon.co.uk, www.amazon.de, www.amazon.co.jp, www.amazon.fr, www.amazon.ca, www.amazon.cn, www.amazon.it, and www.amazon.es. As used herein, "Amazon.com," "we," "our" and similar terms include Amazon.com, Inc., and its subsidiaries, unless the context indicates otherwise.
Forward-Looking Statements
This announcement
contains forward-looking statements within the meaning of Section
27A of the Securities Act of 1933 and Section 21E of the Securities
Exchange Act of 1934. Actual results may differ significantly from
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About Penguin Group (USA)
Penguin Group (USA) Inc. is the U.S. member of the internationally
renowned Penguin Group. Penguin Group (USA) is one of the leading
U.S. adult and children's trade book publishers, owning a wide range
of imprints and trademarks, including Viking, G. P. Putnam's Sons,
The Penguin Press, Riverhead Books, Dutton, Penguin Books, Berkley
Books, Gotham Books, Portfolio, New American Library, Plume,
Tarcher, Philomel, Grosset & Dunlap, Puffin, and Frederick Warne,
among others. The Penguin Group (http://www.penguin.com)
is part of Pearson plc, the international media company.
About CreateSpace
CreateSpace seeks to be the world's easiest and most comprehensive
independent publishing platform for writers, filmmakers and
musicians. The company is the leading provider of independent
publishing tools that enable content creators to produce, polish,
publish and distribute their work to customers around the world.
CreateSpace offers industry-leading royalty rates, broad
distribution to thousands of sales channels, an engaged peer
community and complete creative control while content creators
continue to own the rights to their work. CreateSpace is also a
leader in manufacture on-demand for Books, CDs and DVDs maintaining
"in-stock" availability for titles without inventory risk.
CreateSpace is a brand of On-Demand Publishing LLC, a subsidiary of
Amazon.com, Inc. (NASDAQ: AMZN).
MEDIA CONTACTS:
For Amazon.com
Amazon Media Hotline
206-266-7180, www.amazon.com/pr
For Penguin Group (USA)
Erica Glass
212-366-2951, erica.glass@us.penguingroup.com
