Independent Publisher Book Awards

The Independent Publisher Book Awards, also known as the IPPY Awards, is an annual book awards contest conducted to honor the year's best independently published titles.^[1][2] The awards are open to independent authors and publishers worldwide—including small presses, university presses, and authors of self-published works—who produce books written in English and that are intended for the North American market.^[2] The Independent Publisher Book Award is considered one of the highest honors^[3] for books published by independent publishers.

History

The awards were conceived in 1996 as a broad-based, unaffiliated awards program open to all members of the independent publishing industry.^[4] Since the creation of the Independent Publisher Book Awards, the contest has expanded in size - today, more than 4,500 "IPPYs" have been awarded to authors and publishers around the world.^[5]

In 2006, regional categories were added to the contest to spotlight the best entries of each area and books written or published with a regional focus.^[6]

In 2012, the awards categories were expanded to include e-book categories in response to the growing use of e-readers. The e-book categories received 390 entries in the first year.

Entry and Prize Consideration

Like other literary prize programs such as the Pulitzer Prize or the National Book Award, the Independent Publisher Book Awards does not automatically consider all applicable works in the media, but only those that have specifically entered. And as with other awards programs, there is a nominal entry fee: in 2016, the fee for the national program ranged from $75 during an early-bird time period to $95 for entries received closer to the deadlines.

About 2,400 publishers participate in the Awards each year, from every U.S. state, Canada, and English-speaking countries overseas around the world. The 2015 IPPY Awards attracted 5,700 total entries; gold, silver, and bronze medal winners came from 45 U.S. states plus the District of Columbia, six Canadian provinces, and ten countries overseas. National categories cover different genres, children's books and poetry, among others. For regional categories, gold, silver and bronze medals are given for the best fiction and best non-fiction books in each of the 11 regions. The e-book categories include fiction, non-fiction, children's books and best regional e-book for the east and west of the USA.^[2]

Notable Recipients

Among the medalists in 2016 there are university presses including Princeton, Stanford, Yale, and other major university presses. Among the fiction gold medalists is Elena Ferrante's The Story of the Lost Child, originally published in Italy and issued in English by Europa, which the New York Times selected as one of the Ten Best Books of 2015.^[7]

Previous winners in fiction categories have come from distinguished small presses such as Milkweed, Coffee House, Graywolf, The Other Press, McPherson, Europa, and McSweeney's. IPPY Gold Medal winners Lord of Misrule also won the National Book Award and The Patience Stone also won France's leading literary prize, the Prix Goncourt (the French edition). David Eggers won a fiction gold medal for What is the What, a New York Times Notable Book.^[8] Margaret Atwood won in 2003 for Negotiating with the Dead: A Writer on Writing. ^[9] Juan Felipe Herrera, the United States Poet Laureate, won an IPPY gold medal in 2005 for Featherless (Desplumado).

References