The General Fiction Category!

A few months ago I submitted The Trail Back Out for a book award. The San Francisco Book Festival and its affiliated book festivals have been around since 1999 – the cost to enter wasn’t outrageous – and my book had already placed for five other book awards.

There was one major drawback. The festival doesn’t have a category for short story collections. I had to submit my book as General Fiction, and that meant it was up against novels, romances, mysteries, chick lit, thrillers,

and pretty much everyone else….

Imagine my shock when The Trail Back Out WON. I was named WINNER in General Fiction!

I wrote the festival administrators, asking for information about the honor my book had just received. They don’t give out figures on the number of entrants, but did tell me that fewer than 5% of the books considered ever place in their festivals. I did the math and figure The Trail Back Out was chosen as the best book in a field of more than 600 books.

Here is the link for the results for the 2023 San Francisco Book Festival: http://www.sanfranciscobookfestival.com/winners_2023.htm

Winner in General Fiction, everybody!

NOTES: ©2023 Jadi Campbell (still not entirely sure what the category of General Fiction includes).

My books are Broken In: A Novel in Stories, Tsunami Cowboys, Grounded, and The Trail Back Out

Tsunami Cowboys was longlisted for the 2019 ScreenCraft Cinematic Book Award. Broken In: A Novel in Stories was  semifinalist for the international 2020 Hawk Mountain Short Story Collection Award from Hidden River Arts and Finalist for Greece’s 2021 Eyelands Book of the Year Award (Short Stories).

The Trail Back Out was the 2023 San Francisco Book Festival Winner for General Fiction, American Book Fest 2020 Best Book Award Finalist: Fiction Anthologies, Runner-Up for the 2021 Top Shelf Award, 2021 IAN Book of the Year Award Short Story Collection Finalist, and awarded a 2021 Wishing Shelf Red Ribbon. The title story The Trail Back Out was longlisted for the 2021 ScreenCraft Cinematic Short Story Award.

Click here for my author page to learn more about me and purchase my books.

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