Friday, August 31, 2012

Dzanc Books Mid-Career Novel Award

ANDY PLATTNER WINS DZANC MID-CAREER NOVEL AWARD
August 14, 2012, Ann Arbor, MI—Dzanc Books is pleased to announce that Andy Plattner is the winner of our 2011 Mid-Career Novel Award.  Plattner’s manuscript, Offerings from a Rust  Belt  Jockey, was selected from more than 100 submissions.  This collection will be published in October 2013.
Steven Gillis, Publisher and Co-Founder at Dzanc Books, notes:  “Andy Plattner's Offerings From A Rust Belt Jockey is a dead on the money infectious novel.   The writing is hilarious and touching, the narrative, and each of Andy's fully realized characters, presents a perfectly pitched tale of love and ambition, honor and betrayal. The ability to be at once funny as hell and at the same time heartbreakingly accurate in the depiction of what it means to be human with all of our flaws and wants and needs is captured with a marksman's eye.  Dzanc is pleased and proud to have Andy Plattner as the winner of our Mid-Career Novel Award.”
“Dzanc is a smart, purposeful press,” Plattner said upon winning. “I know my manuscript will benefit from this collaboration.”

ABOUT ANDY PLATTNER
Andy Plattner’s first story collection, Winter Money, originally published in 1997, is set to be re-released in paperback from the University of Georgia Press at the start of 2013. (The collection won the Flannery O'Connor Award in 1997.) His second story collection, A Marriage of Convenience, was  published last year. He has stories in the current editions of The Southern Review and Fiction, have forthcoming work in The Sewanee Review and apt. Plattner lives in Atlanta with my wife, Diana.

FINALISTS
The short list of finalists consisted of novels from Margo Berdeshevsky, Maria Flook, Karen Osborn, Micah Perks, Russell Rowland, Chris Torockio, Mary Troy, and Edra Ziesk.

ABOUT THE MID-CAREER AWARD
While at times it seems the publishing industry is only interested in the next big thing, we at Dzanc recognize the value of experienced writers who have gone through the process of creating and publishing two or more books. Mid-career writers are the backbone of our industry yet often these writers are overlooked and have a harder time finding a publisher than first time writers. More details can be found at www.dzancbooks.org/submissions/

ABOUT DZANC BOOKS
Dzanc Books was created in 2006 to advance great writing and to impact communities nationally with our efforts to advance literary readership and our advocacy of creative writing workshops and readings. As a non-profit, 501(c)3 organization, Dzanc Books not only publishes literary fiction, but works in partnership with literary journals to advance their readership at every level. Dzanc is also fully committed to developing educational programs in schools.
For more information on Dzanc Books and its mission, imprints, books, authors, awards, and programs, please visit www.dzancbooks.org.
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