‘A Quiet Cadence’ wins W.Y. Boyd Literary Award for Excellence in Military Fiction

CHICAGO  — “A Quiet Cadence” by Mark Treanor, published by The Naval Institute Press, is the winner of the 2020 W.Y. Boyd Literary Award for Excellence in Military Fiction.

The W.Y. Boyd Literary Award honors the best American Military Fiction set in a period when the United States was at war.  The $5,000 award and citation, donated by author W.Y. Boyd II, recognizes the service of veterans, and encourages the writing and publishing of outstanding war-related fiction.

Treanor’s novel is a first-person account of what our service men and women face when asked to fight for this country in conflicts around the world combined with the story of what they thereafter experience when they return home. Narrated through the recollection and reflection of a veteran now on the cusp of retirement, those who served in Vietnam and their loved ones, as well as veterans of our more recent wars, will recognize that the author, a Vietnam veteran, provides an authentic account of the intensity and trauma of combat as seen through the eyes of a 19-year-old Marine named Marty McClure.  

Marty arrives in Vietnam and is immediately assigned as a machine gunner in a Marine company fighting both booby traps and battles against North Vietnamese troops.  He experiences the brutality of war as numerous fellow Marines are killed or wounded, and he is eventually seriously wounded himself and sent back to the United States, where he recovers from his wounds and is released from service. He finishes college, marries and starts a career as a teacher.  Like most veterans, Marty gets on with a successful life as a family man and citizen, but he still has to cope with his memories, guilt, and doubts about the war he believes his country has abandoned.  Only with the love of his wife, and help from his fellow veterans over the years, is he finally able to find real peace. 

The W.Y. Boyd Award Jury is very pleased to have selected “A Quiet Cadence” as this year’s winner.  The annual award will be presented on Sunday, June 27, 2021 at the ALA virtual Annual Conference. 

Naval Institute Press is also pleased to announce that this month it has made “A Quiet Cadence” available in paperback (ISBN: 9781682476505).

Members of the W. Y. Boyd Literary Award Jury are the chair, Robert Schnare, Naval War College, Newport Rhode Island (retired), Tatiana Bryant,  Adelphi University, Garden City, New York, Andrew Mangels, West Lake Porter Public Library, , Maxine Reneker, Naval Post Graduate School, Monterey, California, (retired),   Ronald Steensland, Lexington Public Library (retired) residing in Panama City, Florida, and Beth McGuire, Wendover Middle School, Greensburg, Pennsylvania.

The deadline for submission of books for the  W.Y. Boyd Literary Award is Dec. 1, 2021. Guidelines and applications are available on the ALA website.