Tuesday, September 6, 2011

THE SCORPION TRAIL wins Best Books of Indiana competition

The Scorpion Trail, published by Berkley Books (Penguin, New York), has won the Best Books of Indiana literary competition.  The honor was announced by the Indiana State Library on September 06, 2011.

The Best Books of Indiana contest was created to honor Indiana's long and illustrious literary heritage and recognize Hoosier authors. The Indiana Center for the Books administers the Best Books of Indiana contest annually and accepts entries from Hoosier authors or books that have an Indiana theme or setting.

"It is a privilege to recognize this terrific group of Hoosier authors," said Roberta Brooker, Indiana State Librarian, of the winning contestants. "One copy of each Best Book will permanently join the works of great Hoosier authors like Gene Stratton Porter, James Whitcomb Riley and Kurt Vonnegut within the State Library’s Indiana Authors Room."

Sweazy was a finalist in the same category last year for The Rattlesnake Season, Josiah Wolfe, Texas Ranger #1 (Berkley Books, New York).

The Scorpion Trail is the second book in the award-winning Josiah Wolfe, Texas Ranger series. The novel previously won the 2011 Will Rogers Medallion Award for Western Fiction.

From the back cover: Starting your life over in a big city like Austin, Texas is no easy task, especially for a man raised on the land like Texas Ranger Josiah Wolfe. Now, after uprooting his son to the state’s capital, Josiah must leave Austin to meet up with the rest of the Texas Ranger Frontier Battalion. But before he can get to work, Josiah has to make a quick stop to check on his old friend Juan Carlos. When Josiah finds the livery where Juan Carlos was hiding aflame, he fears he may never repay the debt made the day the Mexican saved his life. To find out if his friend is dead or alive, Josiah searches for the one person who might know Juan Carlos’ whereabouts. But she too has gone missing, and another deadly fire is reported in Waco, Josiah’s quick detour turns into a search that brings up old enemies and new dangers. He’ll have to ride hard and draw fast to find his Battalion…and to return back home..

There will be (at least) six books in the Josiah Wolfe, Texas series with the most current novel, The Cougar’s Prey (#4), published on October 04, 2011. The Badger’s Revenge (#3) was published in April, 2011.

12 comments:

Matthew P. Mayo said...

Congratulations, Larry. This is a well-deserved honor. Your series goes from strength to strength, sir.

Larry D. Sweazy said...

Thanks, Matt!

mybillcrider said...

Congratulations!

Renaissance Women said...

Terrific. It is wonderful that they recognize such talent.You deserve to be in such good company.

Ron Scheer said...

Well done. Gotta feel real good. Congratulations!

Ann Littlewood said...

Hurray! Well done! I am of course insanely jealous and will insist you buy me a drink to make up for it, if we are ever at the same conference at the same time.

Larry D. Sweazy said...

Thanks, Ron, and Anne, it will be my pleasure to buy you a drink.

Tom Roberts said...

An honor well deserved. The series gets better with each new volume.

Tom Roberts
Black Dog Books

Larry D. Sweazy said...

Thanks, Tom.

Richard Prosch said...

Great news! Winning is good, but there's something extra-special about winning at home. Congratulations!

Larry D. Sweazy said...

Thanks. The cool thing, Rich, is this was open to all categories of fiction, so the fact that a western won means a lot to me.

William W. and J.A.Johnstone said...

That is good news! Congratulations!!