So Cal bookseller nominees announced

The Southern California Independent Booksellers Association has announced the nominees for its 2008 awards; all the authors are based in Southern California. I don't remember anything like this in Pittsburgh -- do other regional associations of booksellers have similar awards?

Congratulations to all the nominees. Links to the LA Times reviews are below.

Fiction:
"City of Thieves" by David Benioff
"Winged Creatures" by Roy Freirich
"Imagine Me and You" by Billy Mernit
"Harry, Revised" by Mark Sarvas
"The God of War" by Marisa Silver

T. Jefferson Parker Award For Mystery:
"Chasing Darkness" by Robert Crais
"Snitch Jacket" by Christopher Goffard
"Oscar Season" by Mary McNamara
"Judas Horse" by April Smith 
"Hollywood Crows" by Joseph Wambaugh
"Incomplete Revenge" by Jacqueline Winspear

Nonfiction and children's book nominees after the jump.

is Nonfiction:
"Hometown Santa Monica" edited by Colleen Dunn Bates
"Big Daddy: Jesse Unruh and the Art of Power Politics" by Bill Boyarsky
"Blue Eggs and Yellow Tomatoes" by Jeanne Kelley
Cancer on $5 a Day" by Robert Schimmel
"All the Saints of the City of the Angels" by J. Michael Walker

Children's Novels:
"Nightmare Academy" by Dean Lorey
"Pendragon Book Nine: Raven Rise" by D.J. MacHale
"The Buddha's Diamonds" by Carolyn Marsden
"The Adoration of Jenna Fox" by Mary E. Pearson
"The Hour of the Outlaw" by Maiya Williams

Children's Picture Books:
"The Pout-Pout Fish" by Dan Hanna
"We Are the Ship: The Story of Negro League Baseball" by Kadir Nelson
"If Animals Kissed Good Night" by Ann Whitford Paul
"Not a Stick" by Antoinette Portis
"Our California" by Pam Munoz Ryan, illustrations by Rafael Lopez

Carolyn Kellogg

Photo:  Joseph Wambaugh (right) with Michael Connelly at the LA Times Festival of Books this year. Credit: Tom Politeo