Local author shortlisted for Kindle Storyteller Awards

FROME-based author David Gatward has been shortlisted for the Kindle Storyteller Award 2023 with his book, Silent Ruin, making it through to the final stages of the prestigious literary prize. 

The Kindle Storyteller Award is organised by Amazon to recognise outstanding writing and is open to authors who write in English in any genre and publish their work through Kindle Direct Publishing.

David is just one of five authors out of thousands to have got through to the shortlist. “I’m absolutely delighted and a little shocked to have made it through to the final,” explains David. “It’s an honour to have been chosen by readers and I can’t wait to hear what the panel of judges think about the book.”

Silent Ruin is book 14 in David’s highly successful DCI Harry Grimm crime thriller series, which follows the trials and tribulations of detective chief inspector Harry Grimm, a Bristol-born detective, who gets seconded to the Yorkshire Dales when one of his cases goes badly wrong. The resulting series follows the exploits of the died-in-the-wool southerner as he makes the transition from city life to the much quieter rural idyll up north – but with plenty of gruesome murders thrown in for good measure.

“I was born in Bristol and have lived in Frome for 16 years but I also spent five years of my childhood in the Yorkshire Dales,” explains David. “It was an extremely formative time for me and I completely fell in love with area, so it was the most natural thing in the world for me to take a west country character and relocate them to this beautiful but isolated part of the world and see where the story took me.”

The winning author will be announced in December at an awards ceremony in London. David’s books are available in paperback, eBook and audiobook formats on Amazon.