2025 Western Writers of America Spur Awards

Blue Wild Indigo is the winner of the Spur Award for Best Western Contemporary Novel 2025. Skip ahead to 14:42 below if you’d like to go directly to James Jennings’s acceptance speech.

Testimonials

Blue Wild Indigo

In his Nobel Prize acceptance speech, William Faulkner said, ‘The problems of the human heart in conflict with itself alone can make good writing because only that is worth writing about, worth the agony and the sweat.’ James Jennings taps into that underground stream, the heart in conflict with itself, in his new novel Blue Wild Indigo.

Billy Field, Screenwriter, MGM, Warner Brothers, 20th Century Fox, Director of Gathering Our History from those Who Lived It

a fascinating tale

Jim Jennings is both a skilled author and a fine trial attorney, including experience as a prosecutor. Both areas of expertise are combined to produce this marvelous novel, Blue Wild Indigo. As an author, Jennings uses the characters… to weave a fascinating tale. The strong tension between love and loyalty to another and duty to the greater society is highlighted… One hates to put the book down because of the strong desire to read on and see what happens next.

William G. Paul, American Bar Association President (1999-2000), Oklahoma Hall of Fame (2003)

steeped in the tradition

James Jennings’s Blue Wild Indigo is steeped in the tradition of Southern and Southwestern writers like Larry McMurtry and Harper Lee. From the first page, Jennings whisks us away to a time, 1954, and a place, Oklahoma, that now only exists in the imagination of such talented writers… Jennings, a master of creating complicated characters and lush description makes his characters… familiar to us, not because we’ve seen them before, but because they are so skillfully rendered.

Charles Salzberg, 3 time Shamus nominated author of Second Story Man and Canary in the Coal Mine

Vivienne Crystal, Amazon Top Contributor

Highly recommended reading crafted with historical, social, military, economic and human rights details. A MUST read for those who dare to hope for a better dream for the people of Mirador and elsewhere in Mexico!!!

Vivienne Crystal, Amazon Top Contributor

Ravia Tanveer for Reader’s Favorite

This is a wonderfully crafted novel! A brilliantly crafted journey that I thoroughly enjoyed.

Ravia Tanveer for Reader’s Favorite

The BookLife Prize

This book is full of vivid descriptions and nuanced portraits of people living on the edge until they decide to strike back.

The BookLife Prize

Kirkus critical acclaim for MIRADOR

A substantial tale led by sharply drawn characters fighting for a worthy cause.

Kirkus critical acclaim for MIRADOR

USA Today bestseller Sara Orwig on MIRADOR

Suspense, appealing characters and interesting historical events create a compelling story that is an engrossing page-turner.