Castleton Lyons seeks submissions for eighth annual Ryan
Book Award
Castleton Lyons will again be sponsoring the Dr. Tony Ryan Book Award, a
competition recognizing excellence in writing in the Thoroughbred industry, and
entries are now being taken for the eighth annual award. The award, which comes
with a $10,000 winner’s prize and a Tipperary Crystal trophy, is named for the
late Castleton Lyons owner Dr. Tony Ryan, whose twin passions for great writing
and quality horse racing led to his launch of the competition in 2006.
“We have had seven excellent Book Award winners to date and I have no doubt
that 2013 will once again prove to be a year of outstanding quality in equine
literature. Our sponsorship of the Dr. Tony Ryan Book Award gives me great
pleasure as it is a wonderful forum to promote and reward equine writing as my
father intended when he founded this award in 2006,” Castleton Lyons President
Shane Ryan said.
Qualifying entries must have been published during the 2013 calendar year,
and may represent any genre, including history, human or equine biography,
investigative reporting, hands-on/how-to, photo essay, and fiction, so long as
it is related to some aspect of horse racing. A copy of the nomination form is
available on the
Castleton Lyons website.
Deadline for submissions is December 31, 2013. Finalists will be announced in
March, and the winner will be named at an April awards ceremony held in a
picturesque loft above Castleton Lyons’ stallion barn. In addition to the
$10,000 winner’s check, two runners-up will each receive crystal trophies and
$1,000.
Past winners, finalists and semi-finalists in the Dr. Tony Ryan Book Award
competition have included best-selling mystery author Dick Francis, 2010
National Book Award recipient Jaimy Gordon, and multiple Eclipse Award honorees
William Nack, Joe Drape, Bill Mooney and Maryjean Wall.
Previous winners of the Dr. Tony Ryan Book Award:
2012 Patrick Smithwick, Flying Change: A year of Racing
and Family and Steeplechasing
2011 Milt Toby, Dancer’s Image: The Forgotten Story of
the 1968 Kentucky Derby
2010 Jaimy Gordon, Lord of Misrule
2009 James E. “Ted” Bassett and Bill Mooney, Keeneland’s
Ted Bassett: My Life
2008 Rudy Alvarado, The Untold Story of Joe Hernandez:
The Voice of Santa Anita
2007 T. D. Thornton, Not By a Long Shot: A Season at a
Hard-Luck Horse Track
2006 Joe Drape, Black Maestro
For more information, contact Stuart Fitzgibbon at Castleton Lyons, (859)
455-9222 or sfitzgibbon@castletonlyons.com.
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