Imagine my surprise on Thursday when I got an email from the PenCraft Book Award for Literary Excellence announcing their 2023 winners. I had forgotten all about the contest that I had entered in the spring. I had actually forgotten about all of the contests that I entered. Recently, I thought about the next round of book awards, in 2024, and wondered if it was worth it to even enter next time. It seemed like maybe it was a waste of time and money. Well, the money part wasn’t actually that bad. Nothing more than $100 with an average around $30. The highest prizes for winners were monetary, so it made sense to have a fee. Everyone had said to enter for prizes. It could get you notoriety, and a nice little foil seal to put on your book cover.

But these award people don’t know me very well. You see, I’m that kid who always thought I would win games of chance. I thought that every raffle prize was just minutes from being mine. I thought, “why not me?” To be honest, I wasn’t just that kid. I’m also that adult. Even now, I start to spend my lottery winnings days before I find out that I lost. I just don’t see why it won’t happen for me. Winning the lottery is part of my long-term plans, part of my retirement plan. So yeah, as you can imagine, I get disappointed and discouraged easily. My mom tells me she used to feel so bad for me, because I had so much hope, only to have it all dashed on the ground after my name or number is not called. I can’t even imagine how hard it is for people around me to see me so giddy, only to have to console me after, when I resemble a dog that just got left in a car while its owners are enjoying a steak dinner inside the restaurant.

But this time, it was a little different. I couldn’t remember anything about the PenCraft award, so I opened the email to refresh my memory. But the email did not say much about the award. What it did say was this:

“We are pleased to announce that our judges of the 2023 PenCraft Book Awards for literary excellence voted your book May I Have Your Attention Please as our Young Adult-Coming of Age Runner-Up Winner!”

Okay, wow, I thought. That’s awesome! But then it hit me. What does runner-up mean? Does it mean that other people won, and I didn’t? Am I one of hundreds of people who are “runners-up?” Is it basically the same thing as a honorable mention? So I did a bit of research (not much as it didn’t take much) and found out that no, what an honorable mention is, is pretty much third place. Third place. I can tolerate third place, especially for an award I didn’t even remember I signed up for. So then I got excited. I won an award! I immediately took a screen shot and sent it to my brother, and then called my mother. They were excited for me, even if I didn’t win the money! “It was an honor just to be nominated!” Haha. No, really. The email had gone on to say that I needed to send them my home address so they could send me a certificate and some foil seals that I can adhere to the front cover of my book. That’s pretty exciting!

Well, then, of course, I started to doubt myself. How legit was a contest that you had to pay to enter? Is it possible that this is all a ruse, aimed to get indie authors to spend even more of their personal money on their writing, when in reality, they should be making money, not spending. So on another Google search I went, to find out if the PenCraft award was, indeed valid.

So the first hit I get is an article about scam contests. Oh no. I read the article and it said something about sending in money to these scams, not knowing who the people are, who the judges are, and if they even read your book. I mean, really. I think there were 1,100 entries or something in this contest. Each judge probably had a category. How many books in each category? How many books did these judges even have to read? I mean, okay, let’s say there are 35 categories, and each has 3 winners. That’s 105 winners. On average, each category would have about 35 entrants. So three winners out of 35. Is that percentage any good? And, after all this, did I even get my numbers right, or did I just make all of this up? And I found a list of contests, and whether or not they were legit. And PenCraft wasn’t on either list, so….

But then I read the PenCraft website, and it seemed okay. I decided to just let it be okay. And to make social media posts saying I had won a contest. And you know what? People were really great. I got a ton of hits, and people were really happy for me. People I know IRL have been really happy for me. I haven’t sold any extra books yet, but that’s okay. I don’t know if I would buy a book based on the fact that it won an award. Maybe I would. However, I would probably buy the book based on the fact that it won an award and the author had marked the eBook down to $1 on Kindle for a promotion and just kept “forgetting” to put it back to the regular price (I did that! It’s still $1 on Amazon!). But I am really looking forward to putting that little seal on my covers!

So will I enter any more contests? Well, that remains to be seen. I just don’t know. I have some time, like 4-5 months to decide. Maybe in the meantime, I’ll win something else that I forgot about, and that will keep me going on endorphins and dopamine just a little bit longer.

THIS IS THE AWARD WINNING BOOK! YOU CAN ORDER IT ON MY WELCOM PAGE, OR DIRECTLY FROM AMAZON, BARNES AND NOBLE, OR INGRAM SPARK IF YOU ARE A BOOK RETAILER!

And don’t forget book 2, I Just Can’t Say I Love You is now available at the same places, and eBook on Kindle Unlimited.

Here again are the links to my Facebook page, Debby Meltzer Quick Author, TikTok, @dbmquick and Instagram, quickdebby_author. Please follow me on these pages. And please explore my page here at debbymeltzerquickauthor.com.