The David Gemmell Legend Award for Fantasy

I feel honoured and giddy to announce the following:

From: Stan Nicholls - Chairman, DGLA Steering Group

Deborah J. Miller - Awards Administrator

PRESS RELEASE: 22/09/08:

We are delighted to announce that preparations are underway to present the inaugural ‘David Gemmell Legend Award for Fantasy’ for the best Fantasy novel of the year (2008). The Award has the official support of Stella Gemmell, and has been instigated by friends and professional colleagues to celebrate David’s life and literary legacy.

Nominations are currently being sought from Editors of every major genre Fantasy list for full-length novels, in the English language, first published in 2008. The nominated novels must be deemed Fantasy in the spirit of David Gemmell’s own work. All nominated work will be added to the ‘Longlist’ – which will then be voted upon by the reading public on the Award website.

Voting will not be closing until March 2009, which will ensure readers a chance to read, and vote upon, all the nominees. The top 5 novels will go forward to the Shortlist phase, with the winner decided by a panel of Fantasy experts (to be announced on the website).

The Award trophy - a replica of ‘Druss the Legend’s’ famous battleaxe, Snaga - will finally be presented in June 2009, at a ceremony in London. It is expected that the DGLA will soon become the most prestigious Award for authors working within the genre Fantasy field.

For any further information, please check the website for frequent updates: http://gemmellaward.com/

Or, contact the Awards Administrator on: Admin@GemmellAward.com

Please help spread the word of this amazing award - David Gemmell wrote epic stories with larger than life characters. His death was a loss to the fantasy community and to thousands of his fans and friends.

Mark and I were honoured to meet David shortly after we moved to the UK and he actually knew who we were - I had made contact a few weeks before a signing to ask him to please do a note or a birthday card for Mark. We didn't know we would end up meeting him a day before Mark's actual b'day at FP. David recognised our names and accents, put two and two together so that when we shuffled up with our hoard of books, David stood up and shook Mark's hand and wished him a happy birthday. Mark was stunned (I had not told him I had contacted David weeks before) and for about an hour Mark laboured under the impression his favourite author was somehow psychic! I eventually confessed, purely because I was so stunned that this busy, internationally published author, with tonnes of fans and many other things to remember, cared enough to realise who we were! Every time since then, when we met him, he greeted us by name - now that is some kind of memory, especially taking into consideration the amount of other fans he had every time he did signings!

A truly remarkable man with a heart of gold and the spirit of warrior. Oh, and crazy mad eyebrows. He loved all his fans dearly and made each one of us feel special, singled out for his attention.

The award is going to shake up the industry. Spread the word, visit the site and sign up to become a member and support the award. Stan Nichols and Deborah worked so hard to get this done - they are absolutely amazing and our thanks goes out to David's wife, Stella, who took it upon herself to finish his final novel, to critical acclaim. Stella's agreed to this award, in the memory of her legendary husband. This is our way to honour him. He might be gone, but he definitely will not be forgotten.