Nominees for the 54th Seiun Awards, the Japanese speculative fiction award honoring the best works of the previous calendar year, were announced April 13, alongside the opening of voting for attendees of Sci-con2023, the 61st Japan Science Fiction Convention, to be held in August at the Urawa Community Center in Saitama. The winners will be announced on August 5.
Thanks to N. for making the translations into English.
Best Japanese Long Work
- Galaxy of the Empire of Japan (5 volumes), by Jyouji Hayashi (Hayakawa Bunko JA)
- Star Shaker, by Rokudo Ningen (Hayakawa Shobo)
- Koi Princess Marriage Tale, by Tsubame Randou (Shinchosha)
- Fake Saint of the Year: You Wanted the Perfect Saint? Too Bad! (4 volumes), by Kabedondaikou (Kadokawa Books) (English translation)
- Mushoku Tensei: Jobless Reincarnation (26 volumes), by Rifujin na Magonote (MF Books, Kadokawa) (English translation)
- Protocol of Humanity, by Satoshi Hase (Hayakawa Shobo)
- The Map and the Fist, by Satoshi Ogawa (Shueisha)
- Godzilla Singular Point (novelization), by Toh EnJoe (Shueisha)
Best Japanese Short Work
- “Consider the Kaleidoscopic Setlist,” from the collection of the same name, by Katsuie Shibata (Hayakawa Bunko JA)
- “Shopping Explosion,” from the February 2022 issue of S-F Magazine, by Tokio Amazawa (Hayakawa Shobo)
- “The Mortal Game,” from the August 2022 issue of S-F Magazine, by Kouichi Harukure (Hayakawa Shobo)
- “Bone Engraving,” from the June 2022 issue of S-F Magazine and reprinted in the collection Kaisha, by Yuuki Shasendou (Hayakawa Shobo)
- “First, Let Us Assume That A Cow Is A Sphere”, from the collection of the same name, by Yuba Isukari (Kawade Shobō Shinsha)
- “The Sagacious Stags,” from the collection of the same name, by Kouichi Harukure (Hayakawa Bunko JA)
- “Schrodinger’s Girl,” from the collection of the same name, by Yuuki Matsuzaki (Sogen SF Bunko, Tokyo Sogensha)
Best Translated Long Work
- Ninth Step Station, by Malka Older, Fran Wilde, Jacqueline Koyanagi and Curtis C. Chen. Translated by Kana Yoshimoto, Yui Nogami, Sumiko Kudou, Yuka Tatekawa (Takeshobo Bunko) (English original)
- NSA – National Security Agency (NSA – Nationales Sicherheits-Amt), by Andreas Eschbach. Translated by Momoko Akasaka (Hayakawa Bunko SF) (German original)
- The Anomaly (L’anomalie), by Hervé Le Tellier. Translated by Kaori Kato (Hayakawa Shobo) (French original, English translation)
- The Redemption of Time, by Baoshu. Translated by Nozomi Oomori, Wan Chai, Sakura Mitsuyoshi (Hayakawa Shobo) (English translation)
- The Last Astronaut, by David Wellington. Translated by Naoya Nakahara (Hayakawa Bunko SF) (English original)
- Ball Lightning, by Liu Cixin. Translated by Nozomi Oomori (Hayakawa Shobo) (English translation)
- Foundation series (new translation), by Isaac Asimov. Translated by Yasuko Kaji (Sogen SF Bunko, Tokyo Sogensha)
Best Translated Short Work
- “Polished Performance,” from Made To Order: Robots and Revolution, by Alastair Reynolds. Translated by Naoya Nakahara (Tokyo Sogensha) (original English release)
- “Go. Now. Fix.,” from the June 2022 issue of S-F Magazine, by Timons Esaias. Translated by Masato Naruniwa (Hayakawa Shobo) (reading of English original)
- “Unfamiliar Gods,” from Cosmic Powers: The Saga Anthology of Far-Away Galaxies, by Adam-Troy Castro & Judi B. Castro. Translated by Kazuko Onoda (Tokyo Sogensha) (original English release)
- “Running Red,” from Chinese Female SF Writers Anthology: Running Red, by Su Wanwen. Translated by Toya Tachihara (Chuokoron-Shinsha)
- “Sooner or Later Everything Falls Into the Sea,” from the collection of the same name, by Sarah Pinsker. Translated by Izumi Ichida (Takeshobo Bunko) (original English release)
- The Wandering Earth, from the collection of the same name, by Liu Cixin. Translated by Nozomi Oomori and Masako Furuichi (Kadokawa) (English release)
- “Eichmann in Alaska,” from Highly Personal Superpowers, by Chang Kang-myoung. Translated by Kanae Kira (Hayakawa Shobo) (English translation request)
- “Signal,” by LD Lewis. Translated by Umiyuri Katsuyama (VirtualGorilla+, presented by Kagoya Planet) (English original)
Best Media
- Lycoris Recoil (TV series)
- Taroman: A Taro Okamoto Style Tokusatsu Drama (TV series)
- Break of Dawn (film)
- The Orbital Children (film/TV series)
- Shinichi Hoshi’s Wondrous and Mysterious Short Dramas (TV series)
- Shin Ultraman (film)
- Summer Time Rendering (TV series)
- Suzume (film)
- What To Do With The Dead Kaiju? (film)
- Daicon Film’s Return Of Ultraman (remaster) (short film)
Best Comic
- Second Life Animator, by Gaku Miyao (Young King Comics, Shōnen Gahōsha)
- Golden Kamuy, by Satoru Noda (Young Jump Comics, Shueisha) (English translation via Amazon)
- Chi: On the Movements of the Earth, by Uoto (Big Comics, Shogakukan)
- Dr. STONE, by Riichiro Inagaki (writer) and Boichi (artist) (Jump Comics, Shueisha) (English translation via Amazon)
- Takopi’s Original Sin, by Taizan 5 (Jump Comics, Shueisha) (English translation via Amazon)
- Planet With, by Satoshi Mizukami (Young King Comics, Shōnen Gahōsha) (English translation via Crunchyroll)
Best Artist
- Ikuto Yamashita (animator/cartoonist)
- Yusuke Nakamura (illustrator)
- Kenji Tsuruta (cartoonist/illustrator)
- Tetsuya Imai (cartoonist/illustrator)
- YOUCHAN (illustrator)
- umegrafix (Ryoji Umena) (illustrator/designer)
- Kia Asamiya (cartoonist/animator)
- Naoyuki Kato (illustrator)
Best Nonfiction
- Afrofuturism: The World of Black Sci-Fi and Fantasy Culture, by Ytasha L. Womack. Translated by Motoko Oshino (Film Art) (original)
- Extraterrestrial: The First Sign of Intelligent Life Beyond Earth, by Avi Loeb. Translated by Nobuhiko Matsui (Hayakawa Shobo) (original)
- Globe-Trotter Travel Guidebook: Mu, edited by Globe-Trotter Travel Guidebook Editorial Office (Gakken Plus)
- On SF, by Thomas M. Disch. Translated by Hisashi Asakura and Hana Kojima (Kokusho Kankōkai) (original)
- Hiroshi Manabe: Book of Books, edited by Toshiaki Gomi (PIE International)
- Super Reprint Edition: Taroman Karuta, by NHK “TAROMAN” Production Team and Gosei Studio, illustrated by Ryou Fujii (Kodansha)
- Mobile Suit Gundam: Universal Century vs Modern Science, by Atsushi Ito, Ryuta Kasada, Toshiro Kaneko, Tsutomu Fukuda, Takahiko Koike and Kiwako Sakamoto (Mynavi Books)
- Globe-Trotter Travel Guidebook: Jojo’s Bizarre Adventure, edited by Globe-Trotter Travel Guidebook Editorial Office (Gakken Plus)
- The Day Humans Land on the Moon Again in 2025: The Frontiers of Space Exploration, by Junya Terazomo (Shodensha)
Free Nomination
- The “TAROMAN phenomenon”
- Successful launch of Artemis 1 (Orion spacecraft)
- Expansion of image-generating AI (starting with Midjourney)
- World’s first portable quantum computer launched (English article)
- Yasuyuki “TAIKO” Inoue art exhibition, tokusatsu art director, on the 100th anniversary of his birth (English page)
- Cyborg cockroach for disaster aid (English article)
- ChatGPT
[Thanks to N. for the story and the translations to English.]
I think the first category is Best Japanese Long Work. There never was a Japanese Feature Film that is covered by Best Media.
Thanks for pointing that out. The mistake is mine — trying to fill in a missing category title by going to look at the Seiun website instead of asking N. like I should have….
Thanks for listing all the categories. Many people may have seen the Best Media finalists through streaming services and theatrical release. Some of the magna may have got releases outside of Japan.
I was contemplating including streaming links but I was worried they would be US-locked. Maybe I should have included JustWatch links, that didn’t occur to me at the time.
One thing I find interesting about this year is that The Redemption of Time and Ball Lightning are both nominated in the same category by benefit of both being translated into Japanese and released in the same year. Fanwork vs prequel. Notably, both books were sold in Japan under the “Three-Body” name by Hayakawa (who are also the Japanese publisher of the Remembrance of Earth’s Past trilogy), placing them in the same franchise. It strikes me as a little humorous, especially since RoT (renamed Three Body X) apparently caused some debate on the internet over its unofficial status, and now in Japan, it’s been basically grandfathered into the series and is competing against the series’ official prequel.