The Christy Award, named after the novel Christy by Catherine Marshall, is twenty years old this year. The official web site explains the purpose of these awards:

The Christy Award® is designed to nurture and encourage creativity and quality in the writing and publishing of fiction written from a Christian worldview and showcase the diversity of genres.

I’m a believer in awards, for the most part, though none is perfect. Still, I think novelists can aspire to win an award, and readers can learn what books the particular body of judges considered the best in the specified category for any given year.

The number of categories has changed over the years; now there are nine, including one called Visionary, which is their choice meaning speculative. There’s also a Young Adult category, and often there are books in this group that are also speculative. That’s the case this year, too.

So, if anyone is looking for books they might like to read, consider the finalists for this year’s Christy Awards in the Visionary and Young Adult categories.

Christ Award Finalists—Visionary

Mark of the Raven
by Morgan L. Busse
(Bethany House/ Baker Publishing Group)

Shivering World
by Kathy Tyers
(Enclave Publishing)

The Story Peddler
by Lindsay A. Franklin
(Enclave Publishing)

The Wounded Shadow
by Patrick W. Carr
(Bethany House/ Baker Publishing Group)

Christy Award Finalists—Young Adult

The Crescent Stone
by Matt Mikalatos
(Wander, a YA imprint of Tyndale House)

Fawkes
by Nadine Brandes
(Thomas Nelson)

The Warrior Maiden
by Melanie Dickerson
(Thomas Nelson)

At least two of these books in this last category are speculative at some level, where as Matt Mikalatos’s novel is unashamedly a fantasy.

Some of these names you many recognize. A number have written articles for Spec Faith and / or have had their books featured as excerpts in a Fiction Friday post. (See for example, this one.)

If you’re interested in the finalist books in the other categories, see the complete list at the Christy Awards web site.

By the way, this collection of books might also serve as a guide to Christmas present buying for the speculative reader on your gift list. Whether for yourself or for someone else, Christy Award finalists are certainly good places to start when considering what to read, what to buy

For those who have never read Christy before, I just learned that it is, for the first time, available as an ebook, as part of a 50th year celebration. Not for the award. For the book, which first came out 50 years ago.