Amarillo Globe News – July 18, 2003 --- Amarillo novelist Jodi Thomas will exercise her autographing hand today in a New York City Park Avenue book-signing, getting her muscles in shape to possibly haul home another golden statuette.

Thomas has been nominated for the Romance Writers of America RITA Award, the highest award for excellence in the romance-novel industry - an award with which she's already familiar. She's been nominated, now, four times and has won two.

"If I win, this one will put me into the (RWA) Hall of Fame," Thomas said in a Wednesday phone interview from the Big Apple. "I think I would be the fourth person in the hall of fame who's won three."

Panels of RITA judges spent a month critiquing Thomas' "The Texan's Wager" and 850 other romance novels entered in the competition. In April, she learned her book and a select 82 others had advanced to the exclusive final round.

The 2003 RITA award-winner will be announced at the RWA Awards Ceremony on Saturday night.

"I think a book has to be a little unusual to grab their attention," Thomas said, describing the hero of "The Texan's Wager" (Jove Books, 2002) as a man who communicated by sign language with his deaf-mute mother but was orphaned at age 6 and grew up almost totally alone.

"Through the whole thing, when he can't talk, he signs," she said.

The book follows this hero and his bride, one of three women who confessed to murdering a kidnapper in self-defense. The sheriff sought grooms who would pay their jail fines.

"Of course, the characters struggle with this 'arranged marriage' and the communication issues...but there's also the return of the kidnapper, gunfights, and daring rescues," Thomas said in a news release. "It's an action-adventure love story with heart."

Thomas drew on her own experience with sign language, having worked with a deaf student in her days as an Amarillo High School teacher. Her vocabulary wasn't extensive - maybe 200 words, she said - but it provided a foundation.

"I think that's what made the book special. I think the readers just loved him because he tried so hard and it was so hard for him to talk," she said.

But "The Texan's Wager" isn't the focus of Thomas's booksigning today. Her publisher opted to capitalize on her RITA momentum with an early autographing of the author's first mainstream novel, "The Widows of Wichita County."

"I can't wait to see it. I haven't seen it yet," Thomas said. "It's a book that I have spent so many years writing. I'm really excited."

She will have a book signing in Amarillo on Aug. 17 at Barnes & Noble Booksellers, 2415 Soncy Road, she said.

"Widows" is a current-day story of five women whose husbands were caught in an oil accident. One man survives, but he is so badly burned that the women can't immediately determine which of them is not a widow, Thomas said.

A 30-year Amarillo resident, Thomas has been writing for 14 years, with 16 published books to her credit. She attributed part of her success to luck, part to Texas and part to hard work.

"Part of it is that I write about Texas, and people really like to read about Texas," she said. "I think most people spend their whole careers hoping to be nominated for one, and I have been very, very lucky, to be nominated four times. I am really, really honored."

The RITA Award is sponsored by RWA, the national trade association for authors of romance fiction. Saturday's ceremony is the closing event for RWA's 23rd annual National Conference.

RWA's 8,400 author members write the romance novels that represent 55 percent of all popular paperback fiction sold annually in the United States, generating more than $1 billion yearly, the news release said. by Karen D. Smith
Amarillo Globe News