Drugs Make You Un-Smarter Wins Golden Quill Award

Drugs Make You Un-Smarter Wins Golden Quill Award from the League of Utah Writers. This is the second award for this book. The authors also won as finalists in the Indie Excellence awards, earlier this year.

The League of Utah Writers gave out publication awards at their annual Round-up on Friday, September 16^{th, 2011} in Logan, Utah. This group is nearly 400 members strong and offers workshops for writers of all levels from beginner to published authors. The competition is stiff for published authors. The categories include: Adult Fiction; Adult Nonfiction; Children’s/Young Adult books, and Religious books. Authors and Youth Speakers,  Jill Ammon Vanderwood and Savanna Peterson received first place certificates and a Gold Quill pin, during the ceremony.

Drugs Make You Un-Smarter is written by high school student, Savanna Peterson and her grandmother, Jill Ammon Vanderwood to promote drug awareness to teens.  Savanna tells her story about growing up with a father in prison for drug related crimes. Her brother had parties with drugs and alcohol, while her mother worked. This book gives facts about drugs along with stories of those who have abused them. The reader will learn about rehab, how drugs affect a family and hear from kids who, like Savanna, have made a commitment to remain drug-free. This book includes interviews with celebrities such as VH1’s Celebrity Rehab LCSW, Sherry Gaba; Actor Jason London; Actor and Author Tray Cheney; Author’s Jennifer Storm and Kristen Moller; Sheriff Tom Allmon of the Face2Face program, and Dr. Kishore from the National Library of Addictions.

Jill Ammon Vanderwood is the author of five books for children/young adults. Her book What’s It Like, Living Green? Kids Teaching Kids, by the Way They Live is the winner of three national book awards and won silver last year from the League of Utah Writers.

 Savanna Peterson is a high school student from Utah. She enjoys having as much fun as possible without drugs and alcohol. Savanna has taken a stand against drugs and wants to teach others that drugs are not the way to a happy life.

 Jill and Savanna have spoken at:

• Boys and Girls Clubs
• church groups
• drug rehabs
• school class rooms

They have been interviewed on:

• Fox 13  Good Day Utah
•  KSL News Radio
•  Conversations Live Radio, With Cyrus Webb
• Dresser After Dark
• "A Moment of Change" at CBS radio http://bit.ly/or8H4T
• The Deseret News
•  The Salt Lake Tribune
•  The Valley Journal
• Love to Know: Teen Issues—How a Teen Abstains from Drugs and Alcohol
•  Savanna was featured on the Granite School District Website
• Savanna was interviewed for the Teen Nick website for the ‘Above the Influence’ campaign

For an interview or to book the authors as youth speakers contact:

Jill Vanderwood

Jillpickle11@gmail.com

www.jillvanderwood.com