HWA Silver Hammer, Mentor of the Year Winners

The Horror Writers Association announced a pair of honors today.

SILVER HAMMER AWARD. James Chambers is the recipient of the 2016 Silver Hammer Award, given by the HWA Board of trustees in “recognition of extraordinary volunteerism by a member who dedicates valuable time and effort to the organization.”

As chair of the Horror Writers Association membership committee, he has the honor of helping new members join the organization and former members return. He also coordinates the New York chapter of the HWA, which holds nights of readings, represents the HWA at local events such as the Brooklyn Book Festival and the New York Comic Con, and provides networking for local authors. His other volunteer efforts have included coordinating Halloween Haunts, the HWA’s Annual Halloween blog celebration, and he serves on the conference committee.

James Chambers is the author of The Engines of Sacrifice, a collection of four Lovecraftian novellas described by Publisher’s Weekly in a starred-review as “…chillingly evocative….” He has also written the story collection Resurrection House, the dark, urban fantasy novella, Three Chords of Chaos, and the original graphic novel Kolchak the Night Stalker: The Forgotten Lore of Edgar Allan Poe, which is a Bram Stoker Award Finalist this year.

MENTOR OF THE YEAR AWARD. Linda Addison is HWA’s 2016 Mentor of the Year. HWA presents the Mentor of the Year Award “in recognition of a member who distinguishes herself in helping mentees, while serving in the HWA’s Mentor Program.”

Linda D. Addison is an American poet and writer of horror, fantasy, and science fiction. Addison is the first African-American winner of the Bram Stoker Award, which she has won four times. The first two awards were for her poetry collections Consumed, Reduced to Beautiful Grey Ashes (2001), and Being Full of Light, Insubstantial (2007). Her poetry and fiction collection How To Recognize A Demon Has Become Your Friend won the 2011 Bram Stoker Award for Superior Achievement in a Poetry Collection. She received a fourth Stoker for the collection The Four Elements, written with Marge Simon, Rain Graves, and Charlee Jacob.

Addison is a member of the Horror Writers Association and annually attends StokerCon and the Northeastern Writers’ Conference. She has participated in panels with Harlan Ellison, Jack Ketchum, and L. A. Banks. She was “Poet Guest of Honor” at The World Horror Convention in 2005. Her writing has been featured in Essence Magazine, and she is currently poetry editor for Space and Time Magazine. Addison has also participated in Ellen Datlow’s Fantastic Fiction Reading Series at KGB Bar in NYC. And she is a founding member of the CITH (Circles in the Hair) writing group.