Western Writers of America announces 2022 Spur Award winners

TUCSON, Ariz., March 12, 2022 /PRNewswire/ -- David Heska Wanbli Weiden has won his fourth Spur Award in three years, and bestselling novelists Michael Punke and C.J. Box are also 2022 winners, Western Writers of America announced Saturday at the Tucson Festival of Books.

Presentations to winners and finalists are scheduled for June 22-25 during WWA's convention in Great Falls, Mont.

Weiden won for his short story "Skin," published in Midnight Hour: A Chilling Anthology of Crime Fiction from 20 Authors of Color (Crooked Lane Books). Weiden's Winter Counts was a 2021 Spur winner for contemporary novel and first novel. In 2020, his "Spotted Tail" won for juvenile non-fiction.

Punke's Ridgeline (Henry Holt) won for historical novel, while Box's Dark Sky (G.P. Putnam's Sons) won for contemporary novel.

Chase Pletts's The Loving Wrath of Eldon Quint (Inkshares) received honors for traditional novel and first novel.

WWA (WesternWriters.org) promotes and honors the best in Western literature with the annual Spur Awards, selected by panels of judges. Awards, for material published in the previous calendar year, are given for works whose inspiration, image and literary excellence best represent the reality and spirit of the American West.

Other winners:

Biography: Wynne Brown's The Forgotten Botanist: Sara Plummer Lemmon's Life of Science and Art (Bison Books).

Contemporary Nonfiction Book: Finis Dunaway's Defending the Arctic Refuge: A Photographer, an Indigenous Nation, and a Fight for Environmental Justice (The University of North Carolina Press).

Historical Nonfiction Book: Terry Mort's Cheyenne Summer: The Battle of Beecher Island: A History (Pegasus Books).

First Nonfiction Book: Anne MacKinnon's Public Waters: Lessons from Wyoming for the American West (University of New Mexico Press).

Mass-Market Paperback Novel: Brett Cogburn's This Side of Hell: A Widowmaker Jones Western (Pinnacle).

Romance Novel: Susanna Lane's Imperfect Promise (Five Star Publishing).

Juvenile Nonfiction Book: Steph Lehmann's Montana History for Kids in 50 Objects, With 50 Fun Activities! (Farcountry Press).

Juvenile Novel: S.J. Dahlstrom's Cow Boyhood: The Adventures of Wilder Good, #7 (Paul Dry Books).

Children's Picture Book: author Emily Crawford Wilson and illustrator Jeanne Bowman's Charlie Russell and the Gnomes of Bull Head Lodge (South Dakota Historical Society Press).

Short Nonfiction: Shane Dunning's "The Right Man to Do a Wrong Thing: Charlie Thex, the Bear Creek Sheep Raid, and the Primacy of Fear" (Montana The Magazine of Western History).

Poem: karla k. morton's "Cimarron Herd" (Texas Review Press).

Song: Micki Fuhrman's "You Oughta See Wyoming" (MyMyMy Music).

Drama Script: Lee Martin's Last Shoot Out (Feifer Worldwide).

SOURCE Western Writers of America