Listen up: It’s the Sarah awards - Westfair Communications

Russel Finch accepts his first-place award as Audio Fiction Awards co-founders Anne Heppermann and Martin Johnson look on.

Sarah Lawrence College in Bronxville has teamed up with Audible, a subsidiary of Amazon, for the Sarah Lawrence International Audio Fiction Awards (The Sarahs), that honor the best in audio fiction. Spoken-word recordings, audio books and radio dramas have been growing in popularity. The competition considered more than 200 works from around the world representing a variety of audio works from science fiction to bilingual dramas. The winners were announced during an event at The Player”™s Club in Manhattan.

“This year”™s entries produced the most international field of audio fiction we have had since The Sarahs launched,” said faculty member Ann Heppermann, who along with Martin Johnson of Stockholm created the awards three years ago.

First place went to “Jayne Lake” by Russel Finch of the United Kingdom for his story about Meggie who lost her sight in an acid attack. It was produced by BBC Radio 4. The second place award went to Canadians Mira Burt-Wintonick and Cristal Duhaime for their version of “Romeo & Juliet.” Other award winners were from the U.S. and Croatia.

This year”™s judges were: Berry Sykes of Podcasts in Color; Nicholas Quah of Hot Pod and Vulture; Julie Shapiro from RadioTopia; Andrea Silenzi of Stitcher and Panoply, and Carola Haupt of Radio Papesse in Florence, Italy.