Well, this was unexpected (for me, at least; my editors claim they knew all along).
The Carol Awards are the American Christian Fiction Writers “recognition for the best Christian fiction published by traditional publishing houses in the previous calendar year." While the finalists are announced during the summer, the winners are crowned during a big dinner event at the annual American Christian Fiction Writers conference. The conference is hosted in a different city every year, though this year it will be virtual due to the issues surrounding the Covid-19 pandemic.
All that being said, my debut novel, A Cross to Kill, was submitted for consideration in both the Mystery/Suspense/Thriller as well as the Debut Novel category. While I am not a finalist in the former category, I did place in the latter which is quite the accomplishment considering how many Christian Fiction debuts there are in a year.
I'm so honored to represent Kregel Publications in the 2020 Carol Awards, and I can't thank my agent, Bob Hostetler, and my editors, Janyre Tromp and Dori Harrell, enough for their work in helping me reach my publishing goals and in making A Cross to Kill the very best it could be! I'm also grateful to the team at Kregel for their efforts in not only producing my novels but in getting them into the hands of readers around the world. Thank you!
Now I just need to figure out who to bribe to make sure I take home a trophy.