The preliminary ballot for the Australian SF (“Ditmar”) Awards for 2019 has been made available for comment and correction before becoming final.

The nominees are award-eligible works and persons first nominated by fans and members of the Australian NatCon which have been compiled into a ballot by a sub-committee elected at the previous National SF Convention business meeting.

The Ditmars will be presented at the 2019 Australian National SF Convention, (Continuum 15) in Melbourne, June 7-10, 2019.

The following section details the contents of the preliminary ballot. (Note that the final ballot will include a “No Award” option in each category.

Best Novel

• Devouring Dark, Alan Baxter, Grey Matter Press.
• The Subjugate, Amanda Bridgeman, Angry Robot.
• Faerie Apocalypse, Jason Franks, IFWG Publishing Australia.
• City of Lies (Poison Wars 1), Sam Hawke, Tom Doherty Associates.
• The Beast’s Heart, Leife Shallcross, Hodder & Stoughton.
• Tide of Stone, Kaaron Warren, Omnium Gatherum.

Best Novella or Novelette

• “Triquetra”, Kirstyn McDermott, in Triquetra, Tor.com
• “Cabaret of Monsters”, Tansy Rayner Roberts, in Cabaret of Monsters, The Creature Court.
• “The Dragon’s Child”, Janeen Webb, in The Dragon’s Child, PS Publishing.

Best Short Story

• “The Art of Broken Things”, Joanne Anderton, in Mother of Invention, Twelfth Planet Press.
• “A Man Totally Alone”, Robert Hood, The Mammoth Book of Halloween Stories: Terrifying Tales Set on the Scariest Night of the Year!, Skyhorse Publishing.
• “The Heart of Owl Abbas”, Kathleen Jennings, in Tor.com.
• “Junkyard Kraken”, D.K. Mok, in Mother of Invention, Twelfth Planet Press.

Best Collected Work

• Sword and Sonnet, edited by Aidan Doyle, Rachael K. Jones and E. Catherine Tobler, Ate Bit Bear.
• Mountains of the Mind, Gillian Polack, Shooting Star Press.
• Mother of Invention, Rivqa Rafael and Tansy Rayner Roberts, Twelfth Planet Press.
• A Hand of Knaves, Leife Shallcross and Chris Large, CSFG Publishing.
• Tales from the Inner City, Shaun Tan, Allen & Unwin.

Best Artwork

• Cover art, Likhain, for Mother of Invention, Twelfth Planet Press.
• Cover and internal illustrations, Shauna O’Meara, for A Hand of Knaves, CSFG Publishing.

Best Fan Publication in Any Medium

• Earl Grey Editing, Elizabeth Fitzgerald.
• Pratchat, Elizabeth Flux, Ben McKenzie, Splendid Chaps Productions.
• SF Commentary, Bruce Gillespie.
• Galactic Suburbia, Alisa Krasnostein, Alexandra Pierce, and Tansy Rayner Roberts.

Best Fan Writer

• Liz Barr, for writing in squiddishly.
• Bruce Gillespie, for writing in SF Commentary and ANZAPA articles.

Best Fan Artist

INSUFFICIENT NOMINATIONS FOR ANY FAN ARTIST

Best New Talent

• Elizabeth Fitzgerald
• Sam Hawke
• Bren MacDibble (aka Cally Black)
• Leife Shallcross

William Atheling Jr Award for Criticism or Review

• Damien Broderick, for Pscience Fiction, McFarland.
• Damien Broderick, for Consciousness and Science Fiction, Springer.
• Tansy Rayner Roberts, for Gentlewomen of the Press, Sheep Might Fly.
• Cat Sparks, for “The 21st Century Catastrophe: Hyper-capitalism and Severe Climate Change in Science Fiction” PhD exegesis.