The Libertarian Futurist Society has announced the Best Novel and Hall of Fame winners of the 36th annual Prometheus Awards.
PROMETHEUS BEST NOVEL
- Seveneves by Neal Stephenson
PROMETHEUS HAL OF FAME
- Courtship Rite by Donald M. Kingsbury
A Special Award will also be presented, as announced earlier, to Alex + Ada, a graphic novel by Jonathan Luna and Sarah Vaughn (Image Comics) that dramatizes conflict over the rights of artificial intelligences and explores the nature of personhood.
The awards will be presented during MidAmeriCon II, August 17-21 in Kansas City, Missouri.
The Prometheus Award, sponsored by the Libertarian Futurist Society (LFS), was established in 1979. Presented annually since 1982 at the World Science Fiction Convention, the awards includes a gold coin and plaque for the winners.
For more than three decades, the Prometheus Awards have recognized outstanding works of science fiction and fantasy that dramatize the perennial conflict between liberty and power, expose the abuses and excesses of coercive government, critique or satirize authoritarian ideas, or champion individual rights and freedoms as the mutually respectful foundation for civilization, cooperation, peace, prosperity, progress and justice.
For a full list of past Prometheus Award winners in all categories, visit www.lfs.org.
The full press release follows the jump.
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE, July 11, 2016
2016 PROMETHEUS BEST NOVEL WINNERS ANNOUNCED
AWARD WINNERS ANNOUNCED: Stephenson and Kingsbury
Neal Stephenson’s Seveneves wins Prometheus Award for Best Novel, Donald M. Kingsbury’s Courtship Rite to be inducted into Prometheus Hall of Fame.
The Libertarian Futurist Society has announced the Best Novel and Hall of Fame winners of the 36th annual Prometheus Awards, which will be presented during the 74th annual World Science Fiction Convention Aug. 17-21, 2016 in Kansas City, Missouri.
A Special Award will also be presented, as announced earlier, to Alex + Ada, a graphic novel by Jonathan Luna and Sarah Vaughn (Image Comics) that dramatizes conflict over the rights of artificial intelligences and explores the nature of personhood.
PROMETHEUS AWARD FOR BEST NOVEL
Seveneves, by Neal Stephenson (William Morrow), has been chosen by LFS members as the 2016 Best Novel winner for works published in 2015. This epic hard science fiction novel, about a cataclysmic event that threatens human civilization and the planet Earth, avoids ideology while dramatizing how a lust for power almost wipes out humanity but also how the courage to face reality and tackle overwhelming problems through reason, individual initiative and the voluntary cooperation of private enterprise help tip the balance towards survival, as a small group – including some of Earth’s bravest and richest entrepreneurs – risk their lives to save humanity. (Stephenson also won the Prometheus Award for Best Novel in 2005 for The System of the World.)
The other Best Novel finalists were Golden Son, by Pierce Brown (Del Rey); Apex, by Ramez Naam (Angry Robot); The Just City, by Jo Walton (TOR Books); and A Borrowed Man, by Gene Wolfe (TOR Books)
PROMETHEUS HALL OF FAME
Courtship Rite, by Donald M. Kingsbury (published in 1982 by Simon & Schuster), will be inducted into the Prometheus Hall of Fame for Best Classic Fiction. Set on a planet in a remote solar system, where human colonists struggle with a harsh environment, the novel explores the mathematical concept of optimization in biological evolution, in political institutions, in culture, and in personal ethics through an absorbing story that links dramatic struggles over political ambition and the creation of a family. (Kingsbury also won the Prometheus Award for Best Novel in 2001 for Psychohistorical Crisis.)
The other 2016 Hall of Fame finalists were Manna, by Lee Correy (published 1984); As Easy as A.B.C., by Rudyard Kipling (published 1912); The Island Worlds, by Eric Kotani and John Maddox Roberts (published 1987): and A Mirror for Observers, by Edgar Pangborn (published 1954).
The Prometheus Award, sponsored by the Libertarian Futurist Society (LFS), was established in 1979, making it one of the most enduring awards after the Nebula and Hugo awards, and one of the oldest fan-based awards currently in sf. Presented annually since 1982 at the World Science Fiction Convention, the Prometheus Awards include a gold coin and plaque for the winners.
For more than three decades, the Prometheus Awards have recognized outstanding works of science fiction and fantasy that dramatize the perennial conflict between liberty and power, expose the abuses and excesses of coercive government, critique or satirize authoritarian ideas, or champion individual rights and freedoms as the mutually respectful foundation for civilization, cooperation, peace, prosperity, progress and justice.
For a full list of past Prometheus Award winners in all categories, visit www.lfs.org. Membership in the Libertarian Futurist Society is open to any science fiction fan interested in how fiction can promote an appreciation of the value of liberty as the prerequisite for cooperation, peace, prosperity and a just society.
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Wow – Prometheus usually has some decent winners (notably the Scottish socialist SF cadre) – but they’ve jumped the shark on this one. Not sure what about Seveneves is libertarian? The rigid social castes would seem to be in direct opposition to that, and the government programs to get the people of earth aren’t exactly in line with that ethos. Though the other plans might be considered libertarian – as the great philosopher Meat Loaf wrote, one out of three ain’t bad.
Interesting.
It’s also a badly-written piece of junk, but that’s just my opinion. And secondary to the themes seeming to be tangental to the award.
I was blown away by Courtship Rite when I read it yea, these many years ago, and I always wanted to see more stories in this world, but I’d heard stories that Kingsbury was sitting on one that might not ever see the light of day. Their description of the book is certainly not what I remember, but then I don’t read fiction looking for political subtext either. In their minds, Jack Vance’s The Blue World must be the story of the problems of running a science fiction magazine publishing company
Celebrating Edgar Pangborn would have been good too- his post apocalyptic America was always a great background. I loved him as a gentle story teller, much like Cliff Simak- with only his novel Davy winning any acclaim that I can recall.
HAL of Fame given every year for best/most schizophrenic artificial intelligence, because if you can’t have freedom in your own (artifical) mind, you aren’t really free.
Celebrating Edgar Pangborn would have been good too- his post apocalyptic America was always a great background. I loved him as a gentle story teller, much like Cliff Simak- with only his novel Davy winning any acclaim that I can recall.
His novel A Mirror for Observers won the International Fantasy Award. The award is now obscure, as it hasn’t been given out since the 1950s, but from what I can tell, it was fairly well regarded in its day.
I read Alex + Ada following its previous mention around these parts and was glad to have checked out it. It’s a decent and thoughtful piece of work.
Not just yours. Seveneves is awful. The sole Hugo nominee in the novel category this year to go under No Award.
I still wait forlorn for Finger Pointing Solward. It got close enough to publication that there is a cover, but alas, Kingsbury hasn’t finished it. Given he’s now pushing 90 and hasn’t published much of anything in 15 years, it seems unlikely he will.
I never read a Pangborn story that I didn’t like, and most of his work I flat-out loved.
Chris S.: Wow – Prometheus usually has some decent winners (notably the Scottish socialist SF cadre) – but they’ve jumped the shark on this one. Not sure what about Seveneves is libertarian?
I’d agree — how in the world can they call anything about Seveneves “libertarian”? Did they actually even read the book? 🙄
You only have to look at previous winners to see that being “libertarian” is not actually a factor with this award, and has not been for quite a while. Regular nominees/winners include Cory “I only charge for my books if you want to pay” Doctorow, Scottish Socialists Charlie Stross and Ian MacLeod, and politically-neutral-as-far-as-I-can-tell Jo Walton. And Terry Pratchett. Seveneves is every bit as libertarian as most other recent winners. 😉
Really glad to see the nod to Courtship Rite! It’s been a personal favorite for years! It’s a spectacular bit of world-building, full of wry, subtle humor. Though not for the squeamish.
In fact it has been LFS policy for many years that we give the Best Novel award to the book, not to the author; we have no litmus test of who counts as a libertarian and who doesn’t.
As to the thematic content of Courtship Rite, that’s been a favorite of mine since its first book publication, and I wrote about it just after the press release came out, discussing precisely what looks “libertarian” to me about it (and what doesn’t); if you’re curious, it’s at whswhs.livejournal.com. I’m glad to see other people who are enthusiastic about it. I think it deserves to be counted as a classic, and not just by libertarians.
William H. Stoddard: In fact it has been LFS policy for many years that we give the Best Novel award to the book, not to the author; we have no litmus test of who counts as a libertarian and who doesn’t.
Which is why I was utterly mystified as to why the award was given to Seveneves, which is very non-Libertarian in a number of ways. But I guess Libertarianism is in the eye of the beholder. 🙂
Yay, more love for Alex + Ada!
I’m listening to Seveneves (which, thanks to some Filer(s), I think of as “Seveneyes”) and I’m not sure what I think of it so far, but I’m not far along. I’m giving it a chance (and then some).
I think it’s not so much that previous winners aren’t libertarian as that much of the American so-called Libertarian movement isn’t and that has skewed people’s perceptions. (Judging by their choice of award winners the LFS has a better claim to the label.)
That said, from the comments I’ve seen about Seveneves it doesn’t seem a good match.