2019 CJA Awards - Part 2

I ended 2019 CJA Awards - Part 1 with a promise:-

I'll be back in a few days with the post that I intended for today.

Taking the lead from last year's post, 2018 CJA Awards (August 2018), I'll mention four awards:-

• Chess Journalist of the Year
• Best Chess Book
• Best Chess Art
• Best Chess Blog

'Chess Journalist of the Year' went to the incomparable Al Lawrence. It's only been three years since he last won the same award, which I covered in 2016 CJA Awards (August 2016):-

The most prestigious of the awards is undoubtedly 'Chess Journalist of the Year', won by Al Lawrence for the second time; the year 2000 was the first (see Chess Life, November 2000).

'Best Chess Book' had two winners:-

• Instruction: GM Joel Benjamin; Better Thinking, Better Chess
• Other: GM Andrew Soltis; Tal, Petrosian, Spassky, and Korchnoi: A Chess Multibiography with 207 Games

Last year's 'Best Chess Art' is now split into two categories:-

• Best Chess Art: Val Bochkov, Melinda Matthews, Natasha Roberts; Chess Adventures with FM Alisa Melekhina, Chess Life Kids, February 2019
• Best Single Chess Magazine Cover: Joe Jennings, Frankie Butler; Timur Flies High, Chess Life, November 2018

The category 'Best Chess Art' had two honorable mentions, one for Carlotta Notaro and one for Willum Morsch. The artwork behind all three awards can be seen in my previous post 2019 CJA Award Entries (July 2019).

That 'Entries' post also mentioned two candidates for 'Best Chess Blog'. The CJA award went to First Move Chess by John Henderson. In the 'Entries' post I wrote, 'As far as I can tell, the first post in the full blog is dated after the deadline for CJA entries.' This was an error on my part, perhaps provoked by a lack of obvious navigation tools on the blog. The first post appears to have been Advantage Anand (August 2017). Old timers like me can remember Henderson's 'Scotsman' column stretching back to the early days of the web. The chess blogosphere is markedly enhanced by his presence.

With nine award categories and more than 40 subcategories, I've only mentioned a small fraction of the many CJA awards. Congratulations to all winners!