I am excited to announce my contemporary young adult novel, The Photograph, is moving on to the second round of the Amazon Breakthough Novel Award in the YA category. In round one, judges evaluate the submissions based on the pitch (think Amazon book description). I started as one of a few thousand, but now I am one of 400 in the YA category. In round two, novels are judged by content of the first few chapters.
I am super excited to make it to round two, and to celebrate, I am sharing the pitch with you! Here it is....
The Pitch
Sixteen-year-old Rachel Brandt is excited about her six-month anniversary with her boyfriend, Brent, getting her driver’s license, and competing for a district championship in her first season on the varsity basketball team.
But when Rachel stumbles across a photograph of her parents, she can’t shake the feeling that she is meant to find her mother, whose identity is a secret her grandparents have closely guarded. All Rachel knows is that her mother disappeared around the time her father was killed in action in the Gulf War a few months after she was born.
Her discovery of the photograph sends Rachel on a search for her mother against her grandparents’ wishes and propels her life into a tailspin. She never imagines her search will reveal a series of lies that jeopardizes every important relationship in her life and ultimately lead Rachel to question her identity.
The Photograph is a contemporary young adult novel that follows Rachel’s search for her mother through the backdrop of her basketball team’s quest for its first district championship in twelve years.