The Kindle Storyteller UK Award 2021 is now open for entries until August 31, 2021 and is paying out a top prize of £20,000 again in the fifth year for the award.
Entries must be for books that are available as an ebook and a print book through Kindle Direct Publishing and enrolled in the KDP Select scheme. When publishing the book, StorytellerUK2021 should be entered in the keyword metadata field in order for Amazon to identify your entry. The award also includes Amazon UK marketing support.
Last year saw the first non-fiction winner as Anna McNuff’s Llama Drama took the award with an account of a cycling journey through South America. She says, ‘The main challenge for a self-publisher is figuring out how to increase your visibility. The mentoring scheme Amazon has offered me will be very helpful in this respect.’
Anna now has four books published in her field of adventurous travel but she suffered knockbacks with rejections from publishers before she decided to self-publish. She says, ‘In hindsight, those initial rejections were the best thing that’s happened to my writing career. KDP was so liberating. I discovered that self-publishing suits my personality, you just roll your sleeves up and get stuck in, plus, there’s always something to learn.’
Readers play a big role in helping to choose the shortlist of stories, with a panel of judges, including top figures from the world of publishing and Amazon books, choosing a winner based on factors including quality of reviews, sales and pages read in Kindle Unlimited. The winner will be announced in London this autumn.
The judges for 2020 included TV presenter and author Claudia Winkleman and best-selling self-published authors L J Ross and Mark Dawson.
The Kindle Storyteller Award accepts submissions of new books in English, published using Kindle Direct Publishing. Titles must be previously unpublished, with a minimum of 24 pages in paperback, and they must be enrolled in KDP Select while they are in the competition. Readers should be able to access all titles entered into the prize in print or on the Kindle e-reader or on the free Kindle app for iOS, Android and Fire devices.
Previous years have seen a varied selection of around half a dozen books picked for the award shortlist and a panel of judges will then pick the overall winner.
The first award in 2017 was won by David Leadbeater’s thriller The Relic Hunters while the 2018 prize went to Hannah Lynn for The Afterlife of Walter Augustus which is a blend of contemporary meta supernatural comedy fiction. 2019 saw Ian W Sainsbury win with his debut psychological thriller The Picture on the Fridge.
You can find out more details about the Kindle Storyteller UK Award 2021 here on the Amazon website.
Non-fiction travel book wins £20,000 Kindle Storyteller 2020 Award
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Ian Sainsbury’s psychological thriller takes £20,000 top prize for Kindle Storyteller Award 2019