When I received an e-mail last August that I had won the WILLA Literary Award for Follow the Dream , I didn’t believe it. At first I thought it was telling me I was a finalist (which would have been wonderful in itself) and that I’d find out later. So I had to reread the letter several times before it finally sank in. I had WON! It took several weeks to come down from Cloud Nineteen. This prestigious national award is given by the Women Writing the West organization in seven categories: Contemporary Fiction, Historical Fiction, Original Softcover, Creative Nonfiction, Scholarly Fiction, Poetry, and Children’s/Young Adult Fiction and Nonfiction. Each category has a winner and up to two finalists, who also receive award recognition at the organization’s annual fall conference. The WILLA recognizes outstanding literature featuring women’s stories set in the west. Books published in the previous calendar year can be submitted by publishers or authors, and are read by groups of volunt...