Valencia, CA - Twenty-four writers and artists from around the globe were on hand at Delta Printing Solutions to watch their first book come off the press, L. Ron Hubbard Presents Writers of the Future Volume XXVI.  This tour of Delta was part of a week-long intensive program provided to winners of the Writers and Illustrators of the Future Contests, programs created by L. Ron Hubbard in 1983 to provide a means for aspiring artists to have their work seen and acknowledged.  Over 600 winners have been so acknowledged the past 26 years. And over the past quarter century, as part of their week's activities, winners have toured such sites as: the Kennedy Space Center, Johnson Space Center, the United Nations in New York, the Library of Congress in Washington, DC, the Science Fiction Museum in Seattle, San Diego's Air & Space Museum and an inside tour of the Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena.

"What made this tour so special was the fact that in all the years we have held our workshops, we never had the opportunity to take our winners to the actual book printer to see their first book as it came off the press," stated Joni Labaqui, Contest Director. "This is something writers rarely get the opportunity to experience first-hand.'

Chris Kurtzman, Delta's President, was on hand for the tour. "This was an amazing opportunity for us as the book printer to show the actual writers and artists how the printing process works.  It was truly refreshing to see their creative curiosity and pure excitement about how we manufacture books! They seemed thrilled to see their actual book being printed and bound. We were delighted we could be involved."

Enthusiastic responses from the winners as they saw their stories and illustrations on the printed sheets were quite evident.  But as the binding process completed and they saw their books coming off the line, out came the cameras as they wanted to capture this very special moment.

The winners had been flown in from locations as far away as Australia, Ukraine, Ireland and Canada, to attend a week long workshop taught by contest judges -including New York Times bestselling author Kevin J. Anderson (Dune series), World Fantasy Award winner Tim Powers ("On Stranger Tides" to be adapted as the 4th Pirates of the Caribbean film) and internationally acclaimed artists, Stephen Hickman and Cliff Nielsen-each one an experienced professional in the field providing sound advice based on hard-won experience.

The weekly activities culminated in a gala black-tie awards ceremony celebrating the winners in the L. Ron Hubbard Writers and Illustrators of the Future Contests before a packed hall, which this year included celebrities Martin Kove (Karate Kid trilogy), Lee Purcell (NBC TV series "Persons Unknown" ), Nancy Cartwright (the voice of Bart Simpson), Marisol Nichols (ABC TV series "The Gates") and Josh Robert Thompson (voice of Craig Ferguson's robot co-host on "The Late Late Show")-and thousands more who were logged on to watch the event as it streamed live. The night's keynote speaker was June Scobee Rodgers, Founding Chairman of the Challenger Center for Space Education.

Each writing and illustrating contest winner was presented their trophy by contest judges at the ceremony and combined cash prizes and royalties of over $30,000. The Gold Award to the author of the Story of the Year was presented by Martin Kove and K.D. Wentworth, Editor for Writers of the Future, to Laurie Tom of Torrance, California, for her story "Living Rooms." The Gold Award for the Illustrator of the Year was presented to Seth J. Rowanwood, of Toronto, Ontario, Canada, by Dr. June Scobee Rodgers and Ron Lindahn, a multiple award winning artist and Illustrator of the Future Contest coordinating judge.

The intensive mentoring process has proven very successful. Past winners of the Writing and Illustrating Contests have published over 700 novels, 3,000 short stories and more than 3 million illustrations in the field. The Contests were initiated by L. Ron Hubbard in 1983 shortly after returning to the field of science fiction with his bestseller Battlefield Earth.