18 August 2015

2015 CJA Awards

Three months after the 2015 CJA Awards Announcement, Offline, we have the Prize List for 2015 CJA Awards (CJA = Chess Journalists of America, in case you're wondering). As in past years, I'll just list the four awards to which I pay the most attention:-

  • Best Book (paper-printed only) -- Winner: Liquidation on the Chess Board by GM Joel Benjamin - New In Chess
  • Chess Journalist of the Year -- Winner: Mike Klein
  • Best Chess Art -- Winner: Square One, December 2014 Cover of Chess Life - Keith Halonen
  • Best Chess Blog -- Winner: Chess Book Reviews by John Hartmann

The 'Journalist of the Year' and 'Best Chess Blog' have been known since the entries were published -- Entries Received for Chess Journalist Awards 2015 -- because there were no other entries in those categories. By coincidence, it is the second time on the podium for both winners; see my posts on the 2012 CJA Awards and 2013 CJA Awards for details.

The winning entry for 'Best Chess Art' is shown on the left. I corresponded with artist Keith Halonen back in the late 1990s, after he wrote to tell me how much he liked my World Chess Championship site. Despite this character flaw, his work is excellent; more can be found on his personal site, e.g. Chess Gallery.

The book category included an Honorable Mention: 'The Classical Era of Modern Chess' by Peter J. Monté - McFarland & Company, Inc. I mention it because I hadn't heard of the work before and am using this blog post to jog my memory later.

Another piece deserving special note was 'Winner: Reconnecting with Caissa' by GM James Tarjan, which received two awards: 'Best Features Article' and 'Best Story of the Year'. An Honorable Mention for 'Best Features Article' went to 'How to Catch a Chess Cheater' by Howard Goldowsky. Last year in a post titled The 'No Cheating' Jigsaw Puzzle, I wrote, 'The Goldowsky piece has "award winning" stamped all over it.' The Tarjan story didn't impress me as much, so I'll return to it in a future post.

Heartfelt congratulations to all 2015 CJA prize winners!

2 comments:

Frans M. Hoynck van Papendrecht said...

I think that in the long the honorable mention given to mr. Monté's history book will turn out to be the most relevant. The book is of fundamental importance, it explains why we play the game as we do.

James Stripes said...

Peter J. Monté, The Classical Era of Modern Chess should have won the top prize. Books of this scope and usefulness come along a few times in the span on one’s life. It is a monumental work of scholarship.