The preliminary ballot for the Australian SF (“Ditmar”) Awards for 2022 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.

Some categories include more than five nominees due to tied nomination numbers. And some have less, due to insufficient valid nominations.

The Ditmars will be awarded at the 2022 Australian National SF Convention, Conflux 16 to be held September 30-October 3 in Canberra.

BEST NOVEL

• All the Murmuring Bones, A.G. Slatter, Titan Books.
• The Bridge, J.S. Breukelaar, Meerkat Press.
• The Councillor, E.J. Beaton, DAW Books.
• A Marvellous Light, Freya Marske, Tor.
• Papa Lucy & The Boneman (Books of Before & Now 1), Jason Fischer, Outland Entertainment.
• The Rose Daughter, Maria Lewis, Hachette Australia/Little Brown Books.
• She Who Became the Sun, Shelley Parker-Chan, Tor.

BEST NOVELLA OR NOVELETTE

• “Ariadne, I Love You”, J. Ashley-Smith, in Ariadne, I Love You, Meerkat Press.
• “Dirty Heads”, Aaron Dries.
• “Ghost Recall”, Alan Baxter, in Ghost Recall (Eli Carver 3), Grey Matter Press.
• “The Little One”, Rebecca Fraser, in Coralesque and other tales to disturb and distract, IFWG Publishing Australia.
• “A Vast Silence”, T.R. Napper, in The Magazine of Fantasy & Science Fiction, November/December 2021.

BEST SHORT STORY

• “A Good Big Brother”, Matt Tighe, in Spawn: Weird Tales of Pregnancy, Birth and Babies, IFWG Australia.
• “Goon of Fortune”, Geneve Flynn, in Midnight Echo 16.
• “The House That Hungers”, Maria Lewis, in Aurealis No. 146, November 13 2021.
• “The King in Yella”, Kaaron Warren, in Under Twin Suns: Alternate Histories of the Yellow Sign, Hippocampus Press.
• “Legacy of the Species”, Pamela Jeffs, in The Terralight Collection, Four Ink Press.
• “A Whisper in the Death Pit”, Kyla Lee Ward, in Weirdbook 44, Wildside Press.

BEST COLLECTED WORK

• Coralesque and Other Tales To Disturb and Distract, Rebecca Fraser, IFWG Publishing Australia.
• The Gulp, Alan Baxter, 13th Dragon Books, self-published.
• Relics, Wrecks & Ruins, Aiki Flinthart, CAT Press.
• The Terralight Collection, Pamela Jeffs, Four Ink Press.
• Tool Tales, Ellen Datlow and Kaaron Warren, IFWG Publishing Australia.

BEST FAN PUBLICATION IN ANY MEDIUM

• Earl Grey Editing, Elizabeth Fitzgerald.
• SF Commentary, Bruce Gillespie.

BEST FAN WRITER

• Kat Clay, for interviews and reviews on YouTube and katclay.com.

BEST FAN ARTIST

• C.H. Pearce, for fanart on Instagram, including (Em and Gyre), (Lysande), (Cruelty Free), and (Rocket Launch Good).

BEST ARTWORK

INSUFFICIENT NOMINATIONS

BEST NEW TALENT

INSUFFICIENT NOMINATIONS

WILLIAM ATHELING JR AWARD FOR CRITICISM OR REVIEW

• Eugen Bacon, for Aurealis Reviews (editor and reviews).
• Claire Fitzpatrick, for “How Mary Shelley Continues to Influence Modern Science Fiction”, in Aurealis 145.
• Ian Mond, for reviews in Locus.
• Andrew Nette and Iain McIntyre, for editing Dangerous Visions and New Worlds: Radical Science Fiction, 1950 to 1985, PM Press.
• Kyla Lee Ward, for “Vampire Poetry”, in Penumbra 2, Hippocampus Press.