When Sydneyanglicans.net broke the news to Lesley Ramsay yesterday that the book she edited is in the running for Christian Book of the Year, the nomination came as a complete surprise.
"I think it's fantastic " I really didn't think we had a chance," she says.
"We're not professional writers, we're amateurs."
Lesley and 14 "ordinary' Christian women wrote What Women Really
Need: Australian women talk About Jesus, a book of personal stories and testimonies which has sold extraordinarily well.
It has been nominated for the Australian Christian Book of the Year Awards, an annual prize sponsored by the Society for Promoting Christian Knowledge-Australia (SPCK-A).
The winner will be announced at a luncheon at Ridley College, Melbourne on 13 September.
What Women Really
Need is published by Evangelism Ministries, where Lesley is an evangelist to women and her husband Jim is Director.
The initial print run of 5,000 sold out and the book is into its second run of 7,500.
The book was launched in the United Kingdom through the Good Book Company at the 2005 London Women's Convention.
It has sold 5,000 copies in Britain to date.
"The Christian market is quite small and we [Evangelism Ministries] sold it mainly ourselves. We didn't have the wide avenues of distribution and marketing," Lesley explains.
"It's done so well. It's really been quite surprising."
Lesley says there is a lack of evangelistic books aimed at Australian women, and believes it is important that Christian women can have access to books that they can feel comfortable giving away to their non-Christian friends.
She says the success of the book can be attributed to the fact that it is affordable enough for people to buy multiple copies.
"We wanted to make it cheap enough for people to give away," she says.
"One woman said "I bought ten and gave them to all of my friends at work'.
Lesley is in the initial stages of planning another book and is gathering together a team of Christian women writers.
The book will tackle issues relating to women such as body image, feminism and fertility.
Other nominees announced
A number of other Sydney Anglicans are in the running to win the book prize.
They include Sky News presenter Leigh Hatcher for his book I'm not crazy, I'm just a little unwell: my journey through Chronic Fatigue (Strand) and biographer Cecily Paterson for Never Alone: the story of David and Robyn Claydon (SPCK-A).
Last year's winner, singer/songwriter and author John Dickson has had two of his books nominated " Promoting the Gospel: guide to the biblical art of sharing your faith and A Spectator's Guide to Jesus: an introduction to the man from Nazareth (Blue Bottle Books).
John won the top prize in 2005 for his first book in the "Spectator's Guide' series: A Spectator's Guide to World Religions: an introduction to the big five, which included a workbook by Simon Smart (Blue Bottle Books and CEP).
Lawyer and educator Benny Tabalajan is nominated for God on Monday: Reflections on Christians @ work (Klesis), Urban Neighbours of Hope founder Ash Barker for Make Poverty Personal: the Bible's call to end oppression (Urban Neighbours) and biographer Anne Henderson for An Angel in the Court: the life of Major Joyce Harmer (HarperCollins) and writer and broadcaster Sheridan Voysey for Unseen Footprints: the divine along the journey of life (Scripture Union).
Serving on this year's panel of judges are John Calvert, Baptist pastor and College lecturer in church history, John Pfitzner, Lutheran pastor and publisher and editor Hilary Woodley, an Anglican layperson and teacher of English French and History at Wilderness School.
The judging criteria include the original nature of the work, literary style, design, layout, cover, text and illustrations and the contribution that the book makes in meeting a need in Christian writing for the Australian situation and in the Australian market.
Tell us your favourite
Sydneyanglicans.net wants to know which is your favourtie nomination for Christian Book of the Year.
Click here to vote in our online poll.
We’ll let you know the ‘people’s choice’ when the official winner is announced.
