Amazon marketing banners back £20k winner of Kindle Storytelling Award

Amazon is backing the winner of its first UK Kindle Storytelling contest with a marketing campaign that includes banners running on the Kindle Books opening screen on Amazon.co.uk.

David Leadbeater’s adventure thriller The Relic Hunters won the £20,000 cash prize recently out of a shortlist of six titles and the prize includes marketing to support the book

Leadbeater is an indie author with a very successful track record after publishing 23 Kindle international bestsellers across three thriller series over the last five years and approaching a million ebook sales.

The Relic Hunters is an archaeological action adventure story that follows relic smuggler Guy Bodie and his team as he tracks down famous historical objects.

Leadbeater says, “Winning the Kindle Storyteller Award has been a life-changing experience. It’s an honour to be chosen as the winner and truly wonderful to have The Relic Hunters selected from such a strong shortlist. It is thanks to my readers that I have won this prize and for that I am truly thankful. I am excited for the next chapter in my storytelling career and hopefully with the profile this prize has given me, my stories will reach more readers.”

Lily Cole, a judge for the Kindle Storyteller Award, with winner David Leadbeater

The shortlist of six authors was selected based on a number of factors driven by customer interest in the titles and covered a range of genres from historical fiction to fantasy to non-fiction.

The panel of judges who decided upon the winning book included actress and literacy campaigner, Lily Cole; best-selling author Rachel Abbott; Irish author, former literary agent and founder of The Alliance of Independent Authors, Orna Ross; the Metro’s Books Editor Claire Allfree; as well as members of the Amazon Books team — UK Head of Kindle Singles and Chair of Judges, Andrew Rosenheim; UK Kindle Content Director, Amy Worth; and UK Editorial Director for Amazon Publishing, Emilie Marneur.


Amazon recently launched the Pen to Publish contest in India with a prize of one million rupees (around $15,575 or £12,000).

It aims to encourage literary excellence in English language and is open to authors living in India, Canda, Australia, the UK and the US (excluding Quebec and Tasmania).

The contest is running from now until November 10 and authors can take part by publishing their books on Amazon.in through Kindle Direct Publishing and adding the keyword pentopublish2017.

As well as the cash prize, the winning author will get a print publishing deal with Westland Publishing and one-on-one mentoring by a best-selling author Chetan Bagat.

The panel of judges includes actor and author Joan Collins, plus authors Chetan Bhagat, Ashwin Sanghi, Sundari Venkatraman and Westland publisher VK Karthika.

You can get more details at Amazon.in.

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Six books on shortlist for Kindle UK Storyteller Award