Independent booksellers of Australia have voted Tim Winton's Breath (Hamish Hamilton) their inaugural ‘Indie' Award winner for 2008.

The author of the ‘Best Australian Book' receives $19,000, as donated by over 120 independent booksellers. Winton said he was ‘honoured to have won the inaugural award and wanted to thank all those booksellers who still take books as personally as they take their business'.

‘We'd be buggered without you,' he said.

The award for Debut Fiction went to Toni Jordan's Addition (Text); Nonfiction went to Don Watson's American Journeys (Vintage); and the Children's Book award went to Shaun Tan's Tales From Outer Suburbia (A&U).

Winton not only acknowledged the support of independent booksellers, but the uniqueness of ‘grass roots' literature, publishing, and bookselling in Australia. ‘People don't always realise that independent bookselling has become endangered elsewhere in the English-speaking world while here at home independents are a significant slice of the trade. Faced, as we are, with yet another blundering assault on the book industry, it's worth remembering that a vibrant book culture has flowered here despite immense geographical, logistical and historical challenges,' he said.

Leading Edge Books manages the ‘Indie' award through its large membership of both metropolitan and regional bookstores in Australia. General manager Chris Burgess said ‘Independent bookstores hold a special place in the hearts of their customers as havens of enjoyment, stimulation and relaxation in an ever-busier world...Their incredible passion and knowledge of books makes them uniquely placed to judge and recommend the best Australian books of the past year to their customers and the general reading public'. 

Source: http://www.booksellerandpublisher.com.au/articles/2008/10/09735/

This article from Thorpe Bowker's Weekly Book Newsletter and Media Extra is reproduced by kind permission of Thorpe-Bowker, a division of R R Bowker LLC. © Copyright 2008, Thorpe-Bowker

Tags: don watson, shaun tan, tim winton, toni jordan