Three of our Bariso Press books have earned top honors in their respective categories in the 2026 Independent Author Awards (IAA) announced this week. The awards were established in 2024 to honor authors who produce books published, marketed, and distributed by independent publishers like Bariso
Press.
The top award in the Young Adult Non-Fiction category went to Pintsized Pioneers at Play: Homemade Frontier Fun and Danger, co-authored by Harriet and me.
In the Nineteenth Century Non-Fiction category my Betting on Horses: Racing as an Economic Development Tool in Frontier West Texas, 1886-1896, earned the top honor. This was especially gratifying to get this recognition as Betting on Horses was our only orphan, the lone book of the ten originals we have published since 2021 not to receive some type of recognition. It’s nice the book has finally been adopted.
My Too Much the Lion: A Novel of the Battle of Franklin received IAA’s top award for Fiction Book Cover Design. I produced the cover, designing the layout, doing the typography and Photoshopping the image generated by ChatGPT/DALL-E.
“We are honored,” said Bariso Press Editor and Publisher Harriet Kocher Lewis, “that three of our books took top honors in three categories and were named finalists in two other categories. From the beginning at Bariso Press, we aimed to produce quality books and we have taken positive strides in meeting that goal.”
Additionally, Too Much the Lion was one of eight finalists for best book in the Historical-Fiction category. Pintsized Pioneers at Play also was named one of six finalists in the Non-Fiction Book Cover Design category.
So thanks to Harriet Kocher Lewis, who’s also my Spur-Award winning co-author in addition to being my editor and publisher, for accompanying me on this independent publishing journey. We didn’t know what we were getting into when we started in 2021, but we have enjoyed the experience.
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