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Debut Shortlist

2022 Debut Shortlist

We’re excited to announce the shortlist for the 2022 Indiana Authors Awards in the debut category! Congratulations to the following Hoosier authors and their books: 

Caleb Caudell, Indianapolis, for The Neighbor, an odyssey that follows a man who is out of cash and on the run, from his job, his neighbors, the cops and his life.

Christopher Elliott, Fort Wayne, for Before the Dream: Martin Luther King’s 1963 Speech, and Civil Rights Struggles in Fort Wayne, Indiana, an account of Dr. King’s speech in Fort Wayne on June 5, 1963, which was enthusiastically received by his supporters and met with resistance from his detractors, during one of the most turbulent during the Civil Rights movement.

Ashley C. Ford, Indianapolis, for Somebody’s Daughter, a memoir about the complexity of childhood in a family fragmented by incarceration, the physical changes in adolescence that draw unwanted attention from men and a journey to bring together the threads of identity and understand complicated familial love.

Tyrone McKinley Freeman, Indianapolis, Madam C.J. Walker’s Gospel of Giving: Black Women’s Philanthropy During Jim Crow, a biography of America’s first self-made female millionaire in the early 1900s, and her activist philanthropy aimed at empowering African Americans and challenging the injustices inflicted by Jim Crow.

J.R. Jamison, Muncie, for Hillbilly Queer: A Memoir, an enduring love story between a conservative dad and gay son who find that sometimes the differences between us aren’t really that different at all.

Keep up with the other shortlist announcements here, and on Facebook, Instagram and Twitter.