Bookshelfie 2025 Award Winners

   While Bookshelfie launched in late 2024, 2025 was the first year of the site in full swing. Over the year, we read and reviewed 100+ amazing indie books, and made significant improvements to the website thanks to the feedback of the authors who trusted us with their work. The Bookshelfie Awards grew naturally out of that first full year. After reading so many books, we wanted a way to look back and celebrate the stories that truly stayed with us. Obviously, judging books is largely subjective—there is no book quality calculator!—but these winning books are just the ones we felt did something particularly worth celebrating, the ones that lingered in our minds long after we finished reading.

 Every book submitted to Bookshelfie in 2025 had value in their own way, and we genuinely appreciate each one. Choosing winners wasn’t about dismissing the rest, but about highlighting a handful of titles that captured something special for us as readers. These awards are a celebration of indie publishing in all its variety, ambition, and creative risk-taking.

Below, you’ll find the winners of the first-ever Bookshelfie Awards—books we loved, books we can’t forget, and books we’re proud to showcase as part of our first year.

Congrats to everyone!

1st Place Overall: Dancing in the Purple Rain, by Judy Mohr

Awarded for its unforgettable dystopian society, where acid rain and pharmaceutical control shape everyday survival. The novel’s bleak world of economic equality, telepathic courier protagonist who delivers deadly packages, and its dark comedic writing style make it a strikingly timely work of speculative fiction.

2nd Place Overall: Magic, Maps and Mischief, by david green

Awarded for its vividly imaginative and charming fantasy world, its memorable neurodivergent protagonist, and its genuinely loveable cast. The novel’s easy to read nature, exploration of themes of how we treat others, and commitment to happy endings make it a joyful and uplifting read.

3rd Place Overall: The players, act 1, by amy sparkes

Awarded for its impressively realised and historically accurate Elizabethan setting, loveable ensemble cast, and gripping, theatrically paced prose. Its balance of humour and hardship, alongside sharp character work, brings Shakespeare vividly and imaginatively to life.

Best Literary Fiction: Shadows of the Mind, by Owl Talyn Press (anthology)

Awarded for its thoughtful and compassionate exploration of mental and emotional health through a diverse range of stories and poems. Featuring the work of H. C. Kilgour, David F. Balog, Anisha Singh, Joyce Bou Charaa, Diya Lekshmi P. N., Meredith Lindsey, Laura Lukasavage, Any Pascual, Cheshta Sharma, it shows that sometimes the best work is created together.

Best Adventure: The Regression Strain, by Kevin Hwang

Awarded for its gripping fusion of medical thriller and psychological horror, not to mention its creative reimagination of the pandemic story. Its high-pressure cruiseship setting and page-turning writing created one of 2025’s most gripping reads.

Best Fantasy: Gifts with hard Swords, by Scott Telek

Awarded for its psychologically rich reimagining of Arthurian legend, presenting a young King Arthur with an unparalleled vulnerability and depth. By balancing mythic scale with intimate character work, this book made an ancient story feel strikingly human and modern.

Best Romance: All You need is love, by Meg Macy

Awarded for its unapologetic LGBT story and characters, its believable slow-burn romance, and its genuinely likeable found-family cast. With tenderness, humour, and a hard-won happy ending, it offers contemporary queer romance with optimism that uses all the best tropes.

Best Non-fiction: Living Life with Death, by Sarah Jones

Awarded for its unflinching, darkly funny voice and its rare insight into the realities of the death industry. Told in sharp, vivid vignettes, it balances visceral honesty about a side of life most of us know of but rarely experience with surprising tenderness, making for a memoir that is as compelling as it is humane.

Best Poetry: The Fragments of Shadow and Sound, by Richard Risi

Awarded for its accessible yet adventurous poetry, putting together themes of longing, disability, and music with striking emotional candour. Its range of forms, sonic experimentation, and carefully crafted presentation make it a distinctive contemporary collection with real heart.

Best Children's Book: The Bird Who Was Afraid to Fly, by Harker Jones

Awarded for its emotionally honest exploration of childhood anxiety, paired with exquisite hand-drawn illustrations. Its gentle storytelling, respectful treatment of fear, and uplifting resolution make it a beautifully crafted and lovingly presented picture book.

Best Experimental Fiction: Divine in Essence, by Yarrow Paisley

Awarded for its bold, unsettling imagination and its masterful blending of horror and weird fiction. The collection’s demanding prose, thematic coherence, and fearless exploration of identity and transformation mark it as an ambitious and boundary-pushing work.

Best Science Fiction: Crew of Exiles, by Neal Holtschulte

Awarded for its original take on post-apocalyptic science fiction, pairing dark humour with intimate character study. Through the parallel journeys of a fallen post-human and a gamer facing an empty virtual world, the novel offers a thoughtful exploration of what remains when humanity is gone.