The Quill Awards

Though seldom used today, the quill pen remains the symbol of the writer's craft. Just imagine chasing down and capturing a goose alive; plucking the longest feathers from the tip its left wing (these were favored over those from the right wing, as they curved outward and away when used by a right-handed writer); cutting the tip of the quill at the proper angle; dipping it into ink, then scratching it across the paper, trying to say what you want the first time rather than relying on the "delete" key. (I hate to think how many times I've resorted to that beautiful feature in this first paragraph alone!) I often grumble about PCs, but I have to admit, the computer is a writer's best friend.

Despite its name, the Quills Literacy Foundation doesn't honor writers who write with feather pens. In fact, the Foundation presented its first annual Quill Awards in 2005, right smack-dab in the computer age. As a sign of the times, the recipients of these prizes are not chosen by crusty professors or industry professionals. Like the glitzy Hollywood awards upon which they're modeled, the Quills are consumer-driven. Their stated purpose is to inspire literacy while reflecting the tastes of all the groups that matter most in publishing: readers, booksellers and librarians. And the Quills are the only televised literary prizes.

The Foundation is supported by a number of notable media corporations, including Reed Business Information (parent of Publishers Weekly); NBC Universal Television Stations, Parade Magazine, Borders, Barnes & Noble, and the American Booksellers Association. The selection committee (a distinguished panel of editors from Publishers Weekly) reviews original books published in North American and marketed between July 1 and June 30 of the following year.

Five titles in 19 categories are nominated, and the finalists are announced in early June of each year. The Quills Voting Board (comprised of more than 6000 booksellers and librarians) votes for the category winners between mid-June and the end of August. Following the announcement of the winners, readers are allowed to cast their online votes for The Book of the Year. Winning authors in all the categories, plus dozens of other bestselling authors, can be seen at the Award Program televised by NBC in late October.

Some of the categories include General Fiction, Romance, Religion/Spirituality, Biography/Memoir, Children's Picture Books, Young Adult/Teen, Graphic Novels, and Audio books. My favorite category is Debut Author of the Year. In 2007, that prize went to The Thirteenth Tale: A Novel, written by Diane Setterfield. After seeing its description, I've added this intriguing book to my "to-read" list. The review I saw described it as "a love letter to reading, a book for the feral reader in all of us, a return to that rich vein of storytelling that our parents loved and we loved as children."

Not all of last year's winners excite me so much. For instance, the winning audio book was To Kill a Mockingbird as read by Sissy Spacek. I love the novel and have nothing against the actress's abilities, but it's redundant to bestow yet another award to an already classic story. I'd rather be introduced to something new. Same goes for the winner of the cooking category: Joy of Cooking, 75th Anniversary Edition. A fine book, to be sure, but isn't that title a little past its last date of sale?

It also rankles me that Al Gore has won a Quill two years in a row: in 2006, his An Inconvenient Truth won the award for History/Current Events/Politics, and in 2007, The Assault on Reason took first place for the same category.

But you know what they say – people who don't vote have no right to complain. If you'd like to participate in the judging process, log on to www.quillsvote.com this fall to cast your vote for The Book of the Year.

If you vote for Al Gore, I'll have you blocked from this blog.