The Penelope Award
Named for the woman who waited, held everything together, and never gave up on her story. Penelope spent twenty years weaving and unraveling, holding a kingdom together while the world told her to give up. Every writer with a finished manuscript in a drawer knows exactly how that feels.
You wrote the book. Now what?
The Penelope Award is for you. Submit your synopsis and first three chapters.
If Jonas Saul selects your manuscript, you receive a full publishing deal with Imagine Press.
Presented at the Homer Awards gala ceremony, John & George Hotel, Tolo, Argolida, October 22, 2027.
Eligibility
The manuscript
Must be a completed thriller novel written in English. Never commercially published. No current literary agent representing this work.
What to submit
Your synopsis — maximum 500 words. Your first three chapters.
Submission window
Open October 1, 2026. Closes Νovember 30, 2026. No late submissions accepted.
Submission fee
€30 per manuscript. Payable within 48 hours of submission. Manuscripts are not read until payment is confirmed.
How it works
- Submit your synopsis and first three chapters
- Jonas longlists 10 manuscripts
Jonas Saul reads all submitted synopses and first chapters. He longlists 10. Full manuscripts are then requested from all 10 longlisted authors. - Three finalists revealed to the community
The first chapters of the three finalist manuscripts are published to the Thriller Book Retreat community to read and discuss. The community has skin in the game — they have read the book that may be published. - Jonas selects the winner alone.
Jonas reads all three full manuscripts and makes his decision alone. A publishing deal is a professional judgment, not a democratic decision. - Winner announced at the gala
At the Homer Awards gala ceremony, John & George Hotel, Tolo, October 22, 2027, Jonas reads the opening page of the winning manuscript before naming the author. The work is heard before the name.
Submission form
Jonas Saul · Penelope Award judge
Jonas Saul has written 60 published thrillers, founded Imagine Press, and teaches tension and emotion in fiction. He selects the Penelope Award winner alone — because a publishing deal is a professional judgment, not a vote. He knows what a great thriller manuscript looks like from the inside. He has been writing them for thirty years.
Key dates
Submissions open October 1, 2026
Submissions close November 30, 2026
Longlist announced February 15, 2027
Shortlist announced
May 1, 2027
Gala ceremony October 22, 2027
About Penelope
Penelope was the wife of Odysseus and queen of Ithaca. While he was away for twenty years — ten at Troy, ten wandering home — 108 suitors occupied the palace, certain he was dead, pressing her to remarry.
She told them she would choose when she finished weaving a burial shroud for Laertes, Odysseus’s father. By day, she wove. By night, she unraveled her work in secret. For three years, she bought time until a maidservant betrayed her.
Even then, she devised the contest of the bow — the suitors must string Odysseus’s great bow and shoot through twelve axe heads. Not one of them could do it. Odysseus, sitting in the corner disguised as a beggar, strung it without effort.
Every writer with a manuscript the world hasn’t seen yet knows exactly how that feels.
The artwork
John William Waterhouse (1849–1917) Penelope and the Suitors 1912 · Oil on canvas 129.8 × 188 cm Aberdeen Art Gallery and Museums CC0 Public Domain
Penelope is shown weaving — the act of patience and endurance that kept everything together while she waited. The suitors watch. She continues regardless.
The Homer Awards use public-domain classical paintings from the Greek tradition to represent each award.