Scribe Award Winners Announced

Bestselling author Kevin J. Anderson was honored as this year’s Grandmaster at the International Association of Media Tie-In Writer’s annual Scribe Awards ceremony, held Friday night at Comic-Con in San Diego. 

Anderson was honored for remarkable achievements in the tie-in field, which include more than one hundred novels, adding up to over 20 million books in print in thirty languages. His work includes the Star Wars "Jedi Academy" books, three internationally bestselling X-Files novels, the Superman novels The Last Days of Krypton and Enemies & Allies, many novelizations (Sky Captain & The World of Tomorrow, League of Extraordinary Gentlemen, etc.) and, of course, the ten globally bestselling DUNE novels he has co-authored with Brian Herbert. 

Receiving the honor was, for Anderson, “like receiving a standing ovation for something that was already fun in the first place, and I am very honored to be recognized by my colleagues in this particularly challenging line of writing." 

He wasn’t alone accepting honors on Friday. The Scribe Awards, recognizing excellence in the field of media tie-in writing for Best Original Novel in Speculative and General Fiction genres, Best Adaptation, Best Young Adult novels and Best Audio performance, were also awarded at the event, which included a lively panel discussion with the winners and nominees.

Cowboys & Aliens by Joan D. Vinge was the winner for Best Adaptation, Dungeons & Dragons – Forgotten Realms: Brimstone Angels by Erin M. Evans took the prize for Best Speculative Original Novel, Mike Hammer: Kiss Her Goodbye by Max Allan Collins & Mickey Spillane won for Best Original Novel, and Thunderbirds: Extreme Hazard by Joan Marie Verba was honored for Best Young Adult Novel. Mike Hammer: Encore for Murder by Max Allan Collins & Mickey Spillane won the Best Audio award.

Collins was “blown away” by his double win this year, but was particularly pleased that “the work I've been doing to bring Mickey Spillane's unpublished, unfinished material to fruition has earned this kind of recognition." 

The IAMTW (I Am a Tie-In Writer) is dedicated to enhancing the professional and public image of tie-in writers…to working with the media to review tie-in novels and publicize their authors…to educating people about who we are and what we do….and to providing a forum for tie-in writers to share information, support one another, and discuss issues relating to their field. 

 

 

Busy Bee Lee

2012-06-05 14.23.40smallerSorry I have been so absent around here lately… the last few weeks have been intensely busy for me. Here's a quick run-down…with pictures. 

I turned in my 15th, and final, Monk book — MR. MONK GETS EVEN  — to Penguin/Putnam on June 1st, then jetted off to Book Expo America in New York, where I got to hang out with my friends at Amazon Publishing and Brilliance Audio, talk shop with scores of authors (including fellow "Amazon" authors Blake Crouch, Vincent Zandri, Johnny Shaw, Robert Pobi, Deborah Reed, David Hewson, Robert Kroese, etc), and meet Audie-award nominees Patrick Lawlor (the voice behind my book KING CITY) and Luke Daniels (the voice behind the audio version of THE DEAD MAN, THE WALK). (That's me on the convention floor with Mike Holmes, a HGTV celeb that my wife adores)

From New York, I headed to Kentucky, to direct a DEAD MAN music video that I wrote for Amazon to go along with the terrific theme song written & performed by Matt Branham. 

And now I'll digress… on the flight, I was stuck in an aisle seat right next to the toilet…so close, I could have peed into it from my chair.If that wasn't bad enough, a morbidly fat woman sat down next to me and couldn't fit into her seat…so she had to lift up her armrest to spill her blubber onto me. I found myself sitting at an angle, tilted towards the bathroom, which a guy promptly rushed into after take-off to have a gastrointestinal explosion of historic proportions. The fat woman quickly fell asleep…and proceeded to loudly fart her way ac160 Dead Man, Tell City, Indiana, Alex Booty, Misty Sisco, Silvio Busch, Aaron Taylorross the midwest. It was hell.  I didn't know whether to put my earplugs in my nose or my ears. When we finally landed, she asked me how the flight was. I told her we lost two engines but she managed to keep us in the air. She had no idea what I was talking about, but at least I amused myself.

Okay, back to the video. We shot in and around Tell City, Indiana, and at the Hawesville, Kentucky stage of Firelight Entertainment Group, the extremely talented and industrious folks I worked with on my short film Bumsicle. Our DEAD MAN cast included Silvio Wolf Busch and Misty Sisco and we had a blast. (That's Misty and Silvio in the center, between the two monsters. You can see a lot more pictures on the Firelight site and their Facebook page)

The day after wrapping the music video I had to jump into my duties as honorary co-chair of the International Mystery Writers Festival in Owensboro, where I played host to the legendary Firesign Theatre and authors (and now fellow Kentucky Colonels) Max Allan Collins, Barbara Collins, Robert Randisi, Christine Matthews and Libby Hellmann and moderated a panel on writing James Bond novels with Raymond Benson and Jeffrey Deaver.

IMG_1724The highlight of the Festival was a night-time, out-door screening of my Owensboro-set short films Remaindered and Bumsicle, which drew over 500 people to Riverpark Center on the banks of the Ohio River. It was fantastic…and I am so glad that the cast and crew of those films, including actors Todd Reynolds, Rick Montgomery, and Eric Altheide, were able to be there to see the enthusiastic audience response. (That's Todd on screen)

As if that wasn't a big enough thrill for me, at the annual Angie Awards ceremony that capped the Festival, my friends at Riverpark Center surprised  me with a portrait by Aaron Kizer, the incredibly talented "speed artist."  It was a wonderful gift and a great honor.

Kiser Portrait  of leeCroppedAnd all of that was just the first three weeks of June.

July has been much slower… at least in terms of travels…since I've mostly been sitting at my desk, working on my book with Janet Evanovich, who flew into L.A. last week to be a guest on The Talk, which gave us a chance to get together for a wonderful dinner.

I'm also in the midst of editing THE DEAD MAN video with Firelight's Rachael Nunn (the footage looks great!) and reading entries in the "You Can Write a DEAD MAN Novel" contest, which ends on August 1st.

In other words, don't be surprised if I don't have a lot of time to contribute to the blog…

The Big Deal

I can't comment on the details, but I saw this recap of my big news in the "Deals" section of Sisters In Crime newsletter today and it made me smile…

No. 1 NYT bestselling author Janet Evanovich sold the next four novels in her blockbuster Stephanie Plum series, and with Lee Goldberg, four novels in a new series, featuring an FBI agent and an international fugitive, to Gina Centrello of Random House, and Libby McGuire of Ballantine Bantam Dell, by agent Peter Evanovich. This was a major, major, mega-major deal. 

Never thought I'd see the words "major, major, mega-major deal" associated, even remotely, with my name….though I have heard rumors of those words being used to describe part of my anatomy (sadly, my nose).

I am well into writing the book with Janet, who is an old friend of mine, and we're having a ridiculous amount of fun. It's so nice not to be writing a "whodunit" for a change and to be telling a big, thrilling, funny, romantic adventure story. That's one of the reasons I've been so absent around here lately. I've been totally into writing the book…