1) To be eligible for this Texas Institute of Letters (TIL) literary contest, either the book's publisher must be based in Texas, or the book’s designer must have lived in Texas for at least five consecutive years at some point, or the work's subject matter must substantially concern Texas.
2) To be eligible, a work must have been published in print in 2025 or 2026 by a traditional publisher based in North America; posthumous publications are eligible. Self-published, author-funded, or digital-only works are not eligible.
3) To be considered, an entry must be a book that has a significant amount of text and is made available to a general audience through bookstores, other retailers, and libraries. Books from fine presses are not eligible.
4) To be considered, an entry must be the first published version of the work in its submitted design. Wholly redesigned editions of previously published books are eligible.
5) Only one work per designer (including codesigns) may be submitted for this award. A book submitted for the Fred Whitehead Award may also be submitted, if eligible, in a separate category of the TIL literary contests honoring the book's author(s).
6) A copy of the submitted trade book must be provided to each of the three judges for this category: Carol Dawson, Fernando Flores, and Jessica Powers.
7) Each judge's mailing address and preference for receiving physical or digital versions of the work will be provided upon the submission of this form and receipt of $25 entry fee. When sending physical copies of the work, please include a brief note with the name of the TIL award category.
8) Physical submissions must be postmarked no later than January 8, 2027.
9) Contest entrants and their representatives should neither establish contact with contest judges beyond the submission of their work nor discuss the contest with any judge until the winners are announced in March 2027.
10) For more information about the TIL Literary Awards, including previous winners in more than a dozen categories, please visit www.texasinstituteofletters.org. For questions about this award that are not answered in the guidelines above, please contact info@texasinstituteofletters.org.
Required information in the form below is indicated with a red asterisk (*).