There are an unbelievable amount of awards giving to good writing. First, there are the overall, famous ones:
Caldecott Medal
Man Booker Prize
National Book Awards
National Book Critics Circle Awards
Newbery Medal
Nobel Prize for Literature
PEN/Faulkner Award
Pulitzer Prize.
Then, the less famous but still a big deal:
Audie Awards
Bram Stoker Awards
Coretta Scott King Awards
Hugo Awards
IACP Cookbook Awards
James Beard Foundation/KitchenAid Book Awards
Michael L. Printz Award for Teen Literature
National Academies Communication Awards
Nebula Awards
Newbery Medal
Philip K. Dick Awards
Quill Book Awards
Whitbread Book Awards.
And then, those specific to a genre and therefore, for these writers at least, should be listed at the top of this post:
Mystery:
Anthony Award
Agatha Award
Barry Award
Derringer Award
Dilys Award
Edgar Award
Gumshoe Award
Hammett Prize
Herodotus Award
Macavity Award
Shamus Award
Romance:
RITA
RNA's Romance Prize
RRA
Sapphire Award
Zircon Award
For a long, long list of book awards, check out literature-awards.com.
And, if you want to know where the bar is set, check out Julia Spencer-Fleming's debut novel, In the Bleak Midwinter - which won more mystery awards for a debut novel than ever before in 2003 (Anthony, Agatha, Dilys, Macavity, Barry, and the St. Martin's Press/Malice Domestic Best First Traditional Mystery, together with a nomination for the Gumshoe).