We’re coming into the season for Best of the Year awards of various kinds. I think this is a good year to give a little extra time to nominating and voting for the books we love, and books whose content is good for a community under siege around the world.
Goodreads is having their Goodreads Choice Awards – semi-final voting now until Nov 15th, finals from Nov 17-30. There are a lot of books with LGBTQ content nominated, and I do think that winning, or at least making it to the final round, is good exposure for these stories.
In Romance, once of the nominees is Boyfriend Material by Alexis Hall – a book I very much enjoyed. I have a list of all the LGBTQ-content books we’ve found so far on my YA Group – https://www.goodreads.com/topic/show/21737733-lgbtq-in-the-2020-goodreads-choice-awards—semifinals-to-nov-15
If you are a Goodreads member, you can vote here: https://www.goodreads.com/choiceawards/best-books-2020
Goodreads has millions of members, and I’d love to see more of them coaxed into reading M/M and LGBTQ.
The M/M Romance Group on Goodreads is also now open for nominations for their Members’ Choice Awards.
There are something like 40 categories, and books can only be nominated once per category, so there is lots of room to nominate those books you enjoyed, even if you don’t think they’ll win, or they were second in your choice to some bigger already-nominated book. There are also “All-time Favorite” categories, if you didn’t read much new stuff this year, or want to affirm an under-rated book or author.
Nominations themselves are a boost for authors. This year, a lot of people are under stress of all kinds. Just seeing that someone liked our books well enough to nominate them is a warm feeling for authors who sometimes feel like we’re working under the radar.
** Note that you have to be a group member, and the book you nominate has to be on the group shelves. If you don’t want to take time to check, the group mods will be notifying about books that need to be added to the shelves. Just to make things harder, Goodreads’ search function is way bogged down this year. Books added, modified, or merged as long as 3 weeks ago may still not show up on a search (including my own Powered by Ghosts – Necromancer book 2 – which I added two weeks ago, but which is hard to find right now. Release date will be Nov 26th so it has no ASIN.) You can find published books by using the ASIN in the search box, or go to the author’s book list and they will be on there – you can nominate with the book page if necessary.
Books must have been published between the 1st of November, 2019 and the 31st of October, 2020 (the only exceptions to this rule are the “All Time Favorite” categories). To qualify for nomination, the book’s FIRST release needs to be within the dates above. Re-releases do not qualify, even with significant rewrites. Nominations will be accepted from Saturday, the 7th of November, to Wednesday, the 2nd of December, 2020. https://www.goodreads.com/topic/group_folder/416091
Let’s spread some love, and maybe some acceptance, this book-award season.
-Kaje Harper
November 2020