InterVarsity Press (IVP) is thrilled to announce that four IVP titles have been recognized as finalists for the 2023 Foreword INDIES Book of the Year Awards. The honored titles are All God’s Children by Terence Lester, Rethinking the Police by Daniel Reinhardt, Nobody’s Mother by Sandra L. Glahn, and Tell Her Story by Nijay K. Gupta.

IVP books were chosen as finalists in the following categories:

Multicultural (Adult Nonfiction)

All God’s Children: How Confronting Buried History Can Build Racial Solidarity

Community activist and founder of Love Beyond Walls, Terence Lester shares the buried history of the struggles Black people have faced against unjust systems. He tells powerful stories of courage, injustice, pain, and triumph, including ones from his own history. He also unpacks the sociological and cultural dynamics of unconscious bias and inattentional ignorance that keep us apart, and how they can be overcome. This honest account of what it’s like to be Black in America paves the way for the church to move beyond showing support from a distance toward loving one another in long-term solidarity, advocacy, and friendship.

Lester’s books include When We Stand, I See You, Getting Past Stuck, Simple Prayers for Hurting People, and Identity Theft. He also coauthored a book with his daughter, Zion, titled Zion Learns to See.

Political and Social Sciences (Adult Nonfiction)

Rethinking the Police: An Officer’s Confession and the Pathway to Reform

Through personal experiences and the mentorship of Black Christians, former police officer Daniel Reinhardt’s eyes were opened to the dehumanization, systemic racism, and brutality endemic to US police culture. Laying out a history of policing in the United States, Reinhardt offers a new model based on servant leadership, not dominance and control.

Women’s Studies (Adult Nonfiction)

Nobody’s Mother: Artemis of the Ephesians in Antiquity and the New Testament 

Based on groundbreaking research and new data about Artemis of the Ephesians, Nobody’s Mother by Sandra L. Glahn demonstrates how better background information supports faithful interpretation. Combining spiritual autobiography with scholarly exploration, Glahn takes readers on a journey to ancient Ephesus and across early church history. Unveiling the cult of Artemis and how early Christians related to it can give us a clearer sense of the type of radical, countercultural fellowship the New Testament writers intended Christ’s church to be.

Women’s Studies (Adult Nonfiction)
Tell Her Story: How Women Led, Taught, and Ministered in the Early Church

For centuries, discussions of early Christianity have focused on male leaders. But there is ample evidence in the New Testament that women were respected leaders at the frontier of the gospel ministry. Nijay K. Gupta shines light on the inspiring contributions of women such as Phoebe, Prisca, Junia, Nympha, and more.

As part of its mission to discover, review, and share the best books from university and independent publishers, Foreword Magazine Inc. hosts an annual awards program each year. After more than twenty-four hundred entries spread across fifty-five genres were submitted for consideration, the list of finalists was determined by Foreword’s editorial team. Winners in each genre, along with Editor’s Choice Prize winners and Foreword’s Indie Publisher of the Year, will be announced in June 2024.

For a complete list of IVP award winners visit ivpress.com/award-winners.­­

Founded in 1947, InterVarsity Press (IVP) focuses on publishing Christian books that discuss influential cultural moments, provide tools for mental growth through a Christian framework, and equip pastors, professors, and ministry leaders in their work. IVP is a subsidiary of InterVarsity Christian Fellowship.