Category Archives: Awards

2024 Grand Prix de l’Imaginaire Finalists

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The Grand Prix de l’Imaginaire 2024 finalists were announced on April 12. The awards will be presented during La Comédie du Livre – Dix jours en mai to be held May 10-19 in Montpellier, France.

The award’s mission is described on its website with a touch of irony: “Grand Prix de l’Imaginaire is the oldest French prize still in operation – since 1974 – as well as the most prestigious dedicated to the ‘literatures of the Imaginary’. The term ‘Imaginary’ covers all these ‘bad genres’ that are science fiction, fantasy, fantasy, as well as various fusions of these genres and ‘transfictions’ where, for example, some ‘non-mimetic’ elements creep insidiously into a so-called ‘general’ literature.”

The jurors are Joëlle Wintrebert (president), Jean-Claude Dunyach (treasurer), Sylvie Allouche, Audrey Burki, Lloyd Chéry, Catherine Dufour, Olivier Legendre (vice-president), Benjamin Spohr, and Nicolas Winter. The Secretary (not a member of the jury) is Sylvie Le Jemtel.

ROMAN FRANCOPHONE / NOVEL IN FRENCH

  • Trois battements, un silence by Anne Fakhouri (Argyll)
  • Vie contre vie by Tristan Garcia (Gallimard)
  • Le Tournoi des preux / Le Conte de l’assassin by Jean-Philippe Jaworski (Les Moutons Électriques)
  • Du thé pour les fantômes by Chris Vuklisevic (Denoël)

ROMAN ÉTRANGER / FOREIGN NOVEL

  • L’École des bonnes mères by Jessamine Chan [The School for Good Mothers] (Buchet-Chastel)
  • Le Pays sans lune by Simon Jimenez [The Spear Cuts Through Water] (J’Ai Lu)
  • La Mer de la Tranquillité by Emily St. John Mandel [The Sea of Tranquility] (Rivages)
  • Le Ministère du futur by Kim Stanley Robinson [The Ministry of the Future] (Bragelonne)
  • Les Voleurs d’Innocence by Sarai Walker [The Cherry Robbers] (Gallmeister)

NOUVELLE FRANCOPHONE / SHORT FICTION IN FRENCH

  • Traduction vers le rose by Esmée Dubois (1115)
  • Rossignol by Audrey Pleynet (Le Bélial’)

NOUVELLE ÉTRANGÈRE / FOREIGN SHORT FICTION

  • Une prière pour les cimes timides by Becky Chambers [A Prayer for the Crown-Shy] (L’Atalante)
  • Protectorats by Ray Nayler [Protectorates] (Le Bélial’ & Quarante-Deux)
  • Illuminations by Alan Moore [Illuminations] (Bragelonne)
  • Le Maître by Claire North [The Master] (Le Bélial’)

ROMAN JEUNESSE FRANCOPHONE / NOVELS FOR YOUTH IN FRENCH

  • Le Règne des chimères by Ariel Holzl (Slalom)
  • Histoire de la fille qui ne voulait tuer personne by Jérôme Leroy (Syros)
  • Obsidienne by Gaëlle Maumont (Gulf Stream)
  • La Sorcière sans nombril by Julia Thévenot (Gallimard Jeunesse)

ROMAN JEUNESSE ÉTRANGER / FOREIGN NOVELS FOR YOUTH

  • L’Étrange voyage de Clover Elkin by Eli Brown [Oddity] (Bayard)
  • Six couronnes écarlates by Elizabeth Lim [Six Crimson Cranes] (Rageot)
  • Sankofa, la fille adoptive de la mort by Nnedi Okorafor [Remote Control] (L’Ecole des Loisirs)
  • Saules de brume by Jeff Wheeler [Storm Glass] (Rivka)

TRADUCTION : PRIX JACQUES CHAMBON / JACQUES CHAMBON TRANSLATION PRIZE

  • Mikael Cabon for Comme un diamant dans ma mémoire by Guy Gavriel Kay (L’Atalante)
  • Getty Dambury for La Sirène de Black Conch by Monique Roffey (Mémoire d’Encrier)
  • Gilles Goullet for Astronautes morts by Jeff Vandermeer (Au Diable Vauvert)
  • Claire Kreutzberger for Illuminations by Alan Moore (Bragelonne)

GRAPHISME : PRIX WOJTEK SIUDMAK / WOJTEK SIUDMAK GRAPHIC DESIGN PRIZE

  • Samuel Araya for Le Grand Dieu Pan by Arthur Machen (Callidor)
  • Neil Blevins for Mégastructures by Neil Blevins (Mnémos)
  • Anouck Faure for Les Trois Malla-Moulgars by Walter de la Mare (Callidor)
  • Manchu for Protectorats by Ray Nayler (Le Bélial’ & Quarante-Deux)
  • Feifei Ruan for Une prière pour les cimes timides by Becky Chambers (L’Atalante)

ESSAI / NONFICTION

  • Dictionnaire utopique de la science-fiction by Ugo Bellagamba (Le Bélial’)
  • Voir l’invisible. Histoire visuelle du mouvement merveilleux-scientifique (1909-1930) by Fleur Hopkins-Loféron (Champ Vallon)
  • L’Art du vertige by Serge Lehman (Les Moutons Électriques)
  • Terry Pratchett : Une vie avec notes de bas de page, la biographie officielle by Rob Wilkins (L’Atalante)

PRIX SPÉCIAL

2024 Imadjinn Awards Finalists

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The Imaginarium Convention released the 2024 Imadjinn Awards finalists on March 26.

The winners selected by the jury will be announced during an awards ceremony on July 20 at the Imaginarium 2023 Convention in Louisville, KY.

The 2024 Imadjinn Award Finalists in each category are:

Best Anthology

  • Blood, Sweat, and Steel: Tales of Future Combat and Mechanized Warfare, Editor – Mark Greene
  • Chicks in Tank Tops, Editor – Jason Cordova
  • Standing Against All Odds, Editor – William Alan Webb
  • Fantastic Schools Staff (Volume 7), Editor – L Jagi Lamplighter

Best Short Story Collection

  • The End, Kayleigh Dobbs
  • The Unfortunate Problem with Grandmother’s Head and Other Stories, Karen Haber
  • The LawDog Files: Revised and Expanded, Ian McMurtrie

Best Short Story

  • “Some Hidden Soul”, Dave Creek
  • “Duck Me”, Melissa Olthoff
  • “The Ballad of Esmerelda Calhoun”, David Badurina
  • “Primordial Soup”, S.A. Bradley
  • “Don’t Kill the Cook”, J.F. Posthumus

Best Audiobook Narration

  • Privateers & Pandemonium, Narrated by Daniel Wisniewski / Written by Nick Steverson and Melissa Olthoff
  • The Grey Man – Twilight, Narrated by Marcus Barton / Written by J.L. Curtis
  • The Rise of Zhengyi, Narrated by E.G. Rowley/ Written by E.G. Rowley

Best Children’s Book

  • Abyss of Nightmares, Donald R Guillory & Arya C. Guillory
  • The Eerie Brothers and The Witches of Autumn, Sheldon Higdon
  • Awaken, Malinda Andrews

Best Young Adult Novel

  • Trumpus, James Sabata
  • I See You, Frantiska Oliver
  • The Book of Rose, K B Carlisle

Best Faith-Based Novel

  • Heavenly Places: Coram Deo, John Kowalski
  • Wingless, David M. James
  • For the Love of Rhett, Maribelle McCrea

Best Fantasy Novel

  • Dagger of Orion, J.L. Lawrence
  • Touch of Faete, Ligia de Wit
  • Heart Master, Nikolas Everhart
  • Nexus, Jeff Dunne
  • Reckoning Day, Steven L. Shrewsbury

Best Game Module / Rule Book

  • Bloody Appalachia, Josh Palmer, Eric Bloat, and Justin Isaac
  • The Dead West, Josh Palmer and Eric Bloat

Best Historical Fiction Novel

  • Secrets of Mary Celeste, Steve Dahill
  • Legacy of the Valiant, Edale Lane
  • Wavesong, Michael Gants

Best Horror Novel

  • A Fury, Eva Vertrice
  • Shock Waves, Matt Kurtz
  • Polyphemus, Zachary Ashford

Best Literary Fiction Novel

  • Jewels in the Rough: Tales from the Jewelers Workbench, James Pomeroy
  • Pan and the Message Chair, Lawrence Weill

Best Mystery Novel

  • OVERKILL: A Folly Beach Halloween Mystery, Bill Noel and Angelica Cruz
  • Edisto Bullet, C. Hope Clark
  • Homecoming in Murder, Edale Lane

Best Non-Fiction Book   

  • From Boardroom to Backpack: Risking It All, Rob Sangster
  • 28 Years Haunted: The Life and Adventures of World-Renowned Psychic Medium Brandy Marie Miller, Bryan “B.D.” Prince
  • Righting Writing, Michael Bailey

Best Paranormal Romance Novel

  • Embers, Kat Turner
  • Sons of Ymre: Jake, Lilith Saintcrow
  • Shadow & Ash, Crymsyn Hart

Best Poetry Collection (single author)

  • In Memory of Exoskeletons, Rebecca Cuthbert
  • Domesticated Demons, Amba Elieff
  • Weight of Thought, Noah Wieczorek

Best Romance Novel

  • Fall: A Year of Change: A Silver Leaf University Novel, Lisette Blythe
  • Harvest Moon: A Raven and the Crow Romance, Michael K Falciani
  • Tall, Dark, And Cherokee, Lee Ann Sontheimer Murphy

Best Science Fiction Novel  

  • Prince Liberator, Fred Hughes
  • Theft of Fire: Orbital Space #1, Devon Eriksen
  • Standing Among The Tombstones, William Alan Webb
  • Dust of the Ocean, Dorothy Grant

Best Song Lyrics

  • Lost and Found, Jayson William Allen
  • Villanelle, Veronica Torraca Bragdon
  • As the Sky Cries, Jayson William Allen

Best Steampunk Novel  

  • The King’s Regret, Philip Ligon

Best Thriller Novel

  • Checkout Time, John Bukowski
  • Battlefield Missouri, Arnold P. Montgomery
  • The Phantom of the Circus, Michael Houtchen

Best Urban Fantasy Novel 

  • Jason Phoenix and the Demon Lamp, Kyle Adam Willis
  • Monster Hunter Memoirs: Fever, Larry Correia & Jason Cordova
  • Hunting the Hart, Jon R. Osborne
  • Delevan House, Ruthann Jagge & Natasha Sinclair

Kemi Ashing-Giwa Wins 2024 Compton Crook Award

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Kemi Ashing-Giwa

The Baltimore Science Fiction Society (BSFS) announced today that Splinter in the Sky (Saga Press) by Kemi Ashing-Giwa has won the 2024 Compton Crook Award for best debut SF/Fantasy/horror novel, a prize worth $1,000. Kemi Ashing-Giwa is the 42nd winner of the award.

Since 1983, BSFS has given the Compton Crook Award for best first novel in the science fiction, fantasy, and horror genres. The other finalists were: 

  • Deathwind: War of the Harbingers Book 1 by Brad Pawlowski (Sunquake Books);
  • How to Be Remembered by Michael Thompson (Sourcebooks Landmark); and
  • These Burning Stars by Bethany Jacobs (Orbit)

Judging for the award has two parts. First, members of BSFS picked four finalists by reading and rating debut novels published between November 1, 2022 and October 31, 2023. Then, in the finalist round, club members picked a winner.  

The award includes a framed award document and, for the novel’s author, a check for $1,000 and an invitation to be the Compton Crook Guest of Honor at Balticon (the BSFS annual convention) for two years. Balticon will be held this year in Baltimore over Memorial Day weekend, May 24-27.

Kemi Ashing-Giwa studied organismic and evolutionary biology, and astrophysics at Harvard, and is now pursuing a PhD in the Earth & Planetary Sciences department at Stanford. She has a novella, “This World Is Not Yours” scheduled for September 2024 from Tor Nightfire and a novel, The King Must Die scheduled for 2025 from Saga Press.

The Compton Crook Award was named in memory of Towson State College Professor of Natural Sciences Compton Crook, who wrote under the name Stephen Tall and died in 1981. Professor Crook was active for many years in the Baltimore Science Fiction Society and was a staunch champion of new works in the fields eligible for the award. For more details visit award webpage.

Past winners of the award have included Donald Kingsbury, Elizabeth Moon, Michael Flynn, Wen Spencer, Maria Snyder, Naomi Novik, Paolo Bacigalupi, Myke Cole, Charles Gannon, Fran Wilde, Ada Palmer, R.F. Kuang, Arkady Martine, and P. Djèlí Clark. Last year’s winner was Alex Jennings for his novel The Ballad of Perilous Graves.

Reading and rating books for the 2025 award will begin this summer. For more information contact [email protected].

BSFS is a 501(c)(3), non-profit, charitable, literary and educational organization, dedicated to the promotion of, and an appreciation for, science fiction in all of its many forms. The Baltimore Science Fiction Society was launched on January 5, 1963 and has been holding Balticon since 1967.

The Tolkien Society Awards 2024

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The Tolkien Society Awards 2024 winners were announced April 13.

BEST ARTWORK

BEST ARTICLE

BEST BOOK

  • The Letters of JRR Tolkien: Revised and Expanded edition, eds. Humphrey Carpenter and Christopher Tolkien

BEST ONLINE CONTENT

OUTSTANDING CONTRIBUTION AWARD

  • Charles E. Noad

2024 Writers Guild Awards

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The Writers Guild of America announced the 2024 Writers Guild Award winners at a ceremony on April 14.

Here are the winners of genre interest:

TELEVISION

New Series: “The Last of Us,” written by Neil Druckmann, Halley Gross, Craig Mazin, Bo Shim;

Animation: “Carl Carlson Rides Again” (The Simpsons), Written by Loni Steele Sosthand; Fox 

Children’s Episodic, Long Form And Specials: “Romance Dawn” (One Piece), written by Matt Owens & Steven Maeda;

The complete list of winners follows the jump.

Continue reading →

2024 Colorado Book Awards Finalists

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The finalists for the 2024 Colorado Book Awards have been announced. Awards are presented in 16 categories by Colorado Humanities to celebrate the accomplishments of Colorado’s outstanding authors, editors, illustrators, and photographers.

The winners will be announced on June 21, 2024.

Works of genre interest include —

SCIENCE FICTION/FANTASY

  • Silenced by Ann Claycomb
  • Not Quite Dead Geniuses at Large on an Angry Planet by R. Gary Raham
  • Dark Moon Shallow Sea by David R Slayton

SHORT STORY

  • “Uranians” by Theodore McCombs

ANTHOLOGY

  • Stories of the Reconvergence by Angie Hodapp and Josh Viola

YOUNG ADULT

  • Surviving Daybreak by Kendra Merritt

JUVENILE LITERATURE

  • Skyriders by Polly Holyoke

2024 Lefty Awards

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Left Coast Crime 2024 announced the Lefty Awards winners at a ceremony in Seattle, WA on April 13.

Best Humorous Mystery Novel

  • Wendall Thomas, Cheap Trills (‎Beyond the Page Books)

Best Historical Mystery Novel for books set before 1970 (The Bill Gottfried Memorial)

  • Naomi Hirahara, Evergreen (Soho Crime)

Best Debut Mystery Novel

  • Nina Simon, Mother-Daughter Murder Night (William Morrow)

Best Mystery Novel (not in other categories)

  • Tracy Clark, Hide (Thomas & Mercer)

Horror Writers Association 2024 Specialty Awards Winners

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The Horror Writers Association (HWA) today announced the recipients of its Specialty Awards. These will be presented on June 1 during the Bram Stoker Awards® ceremony at StokerCon®2024 in San Diego, CA.

SPECIALTY PRESS AWARD

The recipient of the Specialty Press Award is Thunderstorm Books.

The HWA Specialty Press Award is presented periodically to a specialty publisher whose work has substantially contributed to the horror genre, whose publications display general excellence, and whose dealings with writers have been fair and exemplary.

The award was instituted in 1997, largely due to the efforts of long-time HWA member and specialty press aficionado Peter Crowther.

THE RICHARD LAYMON PRESIDENT’S AWARD

Brian W. Matthews

The recipient of the Richard Laymon President’s Award for Service is Brian W. Matthews.

The Richard Laymon President’s Award for Service was instituted in 2001 and is named in honor of Richard Laymon, who died in 2001 while serving as HWA’s President. As its name implies, it is given by HWA’s sitting President.

The award is presented to a volunteer who has served the HWA in an especially exemplary manner and has shown extraordinary dedication to the organization.

THE KAREN LANSDALE SILVER HAMMER AWARD

Lila Denning

The recipient of the Karen Lansdale Silver Hammer Award is Lila Denning.

In 2022, the Horror Writers Association renamed the Silver Hammer Award to the Karen Lansdale Silver Hammer Award in honor of the tremendous amount of work Karen did starting the HWA.

The HWA periodically gives the Karen Lansdale Silver Hammer Award to an HWA volunteer who has done a truly massive amount of work for the organization, often unsung and behind the scenes. It was instituted in 1996 and is decided by a vote of HWA’s Board of Trustees.

The award is so named because it represents the careful, steady, continuous work of building HWA’s “house”—the many institutional systems that keep the organization functioning on a day-to-day basis.

MENTOR OF THE YEAR AWARD

Lisa Wood

The recipient of the Mentor of the Year Award is Lisa Wood.

The HWA’s Mentor Program is available to all members of the organization. This popular program pairs newer writers with established professionals for an intensive four-month-long partnership. For new writers, the Program offers mentees a personal, one-on-one experience with a seasoned writer, tailor-made to help them grow in their writing and better market their work. For experienced writers, it is an opportunity to pay forward the assistance and encouragement other writers gave them when they were starting out. In addition, there is the added benefit of growing as a writer oneself through the act of teaching others. In short, the Program benefits all who participate, regardless of their roles.

Established in 2014, the Mentor of the Year Award recognizes one mentor in the Program who has done an outstanding job of helping new writers. The award is chosen by the current manager of the Program.

[Based on a press release.]

Mokkil Wins SLF’s 2024 AC Bose Grant

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Vineetha Mokkil

Vineetha Mokkil is the winner of the Speculative Literature Foundation’s 2024 A.C. Bose Grant.

Mokkil’s winning piece is called “No One Has To Know and Other Stories.” She is the author of the short story collection, A Happy Place and Other Stories (HarperCollins). Her new collection, Lawrence of Arabia and Other Stories, is forthcoming from Hawakal Publishers. Her work has appeared in the anthologies The Best Asian Short Stories 2018 (Kitaab, Singapore), The Punch Magazine Anthology of New Writing (Niyogi Books, New Delhi), and Things Left and Found at the Side of the Road (Ad Hoc Fiction, UK). She is currently based in New Delhi, India.

Her stories have been published in the Santa Fe Writers’ Project Journal, Quarterly Literary Review Singapore, Fictive Dream, Barren magazine, The Bombay Review, and Asian Cha, among other journals. Poems translated by her from Malayalam to English have been published in Indian Love Poems (ed. Meena Alexander, Everyman’s Library, USA). The flash fiction collection, Lightning Strikes: An Anthology of Flash Fiction by Fifty Indian Writers (Dhauli Books), edited and introduced by her, was published in 2024. Mokkil was nominated for Best Small Fictions 2019 and shortlisted for the Bath Flash Fiction Award. Her journalistic writing has appeared in The Hindu, Outlook, The Times of India, Open, and Asian Review of Books.

In 2019, the Speculative Literature Foundation and DesiLit co-sponsored the A.C. Bose Grant in memory of Ashim Chandra Bose, a lover of books—especially science fiction and fantasy. Bose’s children, Rupa Bose and Gautam Bose, founded the grant to honor the legacy of the worlds their father opened up for them. The donors hope that this grant will help develop work that will let young people imagine different worlds and possibilities. The A.C. Bose Grant annually provides $1,000 to South Asian or Desi diaspora writers developing speculative fiction. Visit speculativeliterature.org/grants for more information.

Launched in January 2004 to promote literary quality in speculative fiction, the Speculative Literature Foundation addresses historical inequities in access to literary opportunities for marginalized writers. The SLF is a 501(c)(3) non-profit, entirely supported by community donations. For more information, visit speculativeliterature.org.

The Speculative Literature Foundation is partially funded by the Oak Park Area Arts Council, Village of Oak Park, Illinois Arts Council Agency, National Endowment for the Arts and Oak Park River Forest Community Foundation.

[Based on a press release.]

Second Annual Brave New Weird Winners

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It’s an award, says Brave New Weird anthology editor Alex Woodroe, avoiding any “Is it a breath mint? No, it’s a candy mint!” arguments. Tenebrous Press announced the winners of the second annual Brave New Weird Award on April 9, chosen from over a thousand submissions. They constitute the table of contents of Brave New Weird: The Best New Weird Horror vo. 2 which will be shipped in June.

BRAVE NEW WEIRD VOLUME TWO TABLE OF CONTENTS

  • Amitha Jagannath Knight – My Mother, The Exoskeleton
  • Anemone Moss – Everything You Dump Here Ends Up in the Ocean
  • Chris Kuriata – Family Not Going To Heaven
  • Daniel DeRock – Guest Opinion: We must take action regarding the [REDACTED] High School janitor
  • David Simmons – Food is Poison
  • Eirik Gumeny – A Balanced Breakfast
  • Elena Sichrovsky – Embryo
  • Geneve Flynn – A Box of Hair and Nail
  • Hussani Abdulrahim – The Library Virus
  • Ivan Zoric – Our Roots Will Dry Out in the End
  • Judith Shadford – Endless Yearning
  • Karlo Yeager Rodríguez – Up In the Hills, She Dreams of Her Daughter Deep In the Ground
  • KS Walker – River Bargain Baby
  • LC von Hessen – Transmasc of the Red Death
  • M.M. Olivas – The Prince of Oakland
  • Michael Bettendorf – As the Music Plays Groovy
  • Nelly Geraldine García-Rosas – Lullaby for the Unseen
  • Patrick Malka – Show Me
  • Perfect Kiss Strickoll – punctum (o baked alaska for you i am a former american)
  • Premee Mohamed – Quietus
  • Rachael K. Jones – The Sound of Children Screaming
  • Simone le Roux – The Man Outside
  • Thomas Ha – In That Crumbling Home

In addition to the Table of Contents, Brave New Weird has also honored a few notable individuals for their contributions to the New Weird spectrum:

BRAVEST, NEWEST, WEIRDEST IN SHORT FICTION:

And what is New Weird Horror? Tenebrous Press says:

We define New Weird Horror as a Horror subgenre focused on progress, creatively capturing themes and questions that bleed into fiction straight from the modern reader’s life and future. It acts as a challenge to break new ground in terms of form and content and to engage with the unknown. Beyond that, New Weird Horror will be defined by the winning pieces themselves.