My 2010 Hugo, Nebula, and Locus Award Recommendations

After a final rush of reading I've pulled together my nominations for the Hugo, Nebula, and Locus Awards.  I highly recommend these selections and hope people will consider them for their own picks.

The deadline for Nebula nominations is February 15 while Hugo nominations are due March 26. The Locus Award traditionally opens for nominations when the "recommended reading" list and ballot are published in their February issue.

Please note my nominations are arranged in alphabetical order by author/artist/publication. If links to works are available they are also provided.

Nominations for All Three Awards

Best Novel

• The Hundred Thousand Kingdoms by N.K. Jemisin. I also loved Jemisin's sequel The Broken Kingdoms, both of which were published last year, but I figured I'd only nominate the first book in the trilogy.
• Who Fears Death by Nnedi Okorafor. Read my review
• Dreadnought by Cherie Priest.
• How To Live Safely In A Science Fictional Universe by Charles Yu.
• The Habitation of the Blessed by Catherynne M. Valente.

Best Novella

• The Lifecycle of Software Objects by Ted Chiang (Subterranean Books)
• "The Sultan of the Skies" by Geoffrey A. Landis (Asimov's, Sept. 2010)
• "The Paragon Lure" by Tony Pi (Alembical 2, Paper Golem Press)
• "A History of Terraforming" by Robert Reed (Asimov's, July 2010)
• "The Lady Who Plucked Red Flowers Beneath the Queen’s Window" by Rachel Swirsky (Subterranean Online, Summer 2010)

Best Novelettes

• "Flying in the Face of God" by Nina Allen (Interzone 227)
• “River of Souls” by Beth Bernobich (Tor.com)
• "The Jaguar House, in Shadow" by Aliette de Bodard (Asimov's, July 2010)
• "That Leviathan, Whom Thou Hast Made" by Eric James Stone (Analog, Sept. 2010)
• "Stone Wall Truth" by Caroline M. Yoachim (Asimov's, Feb. 2010) Read my review

Best Short Stories

• "Venues" by Richard Bowes, (F&SF Nov/Dec 2010)
• "Alternate Girl's Expatriate Life" by Rochita Loenen-Ruiz (Interzone 229)
• "Elegy for a Young Elk" by Hannu Rajaniemi (Subterranean Online, Spring 2010)
•  "The Spontaneous Knotting of an Agitated String" by Lavie Tidhar (Fantasy Magazine, May 2010)
• "Seeing" by Genevieve Valentine (Clarkesworld 50) Read my review

Nebula Related Category

Andre Norton Award (for Young Adult Novels)

• Ship Breaker by Paolo Bacigalupi
• Mockingjay by Suzanne Collins
• Mistwood by Leah Cypess
• Hold Me Closer, Necromancer by Lish McBride
• The Boneshaker by Kate Milford

Hugo Only Categories

Best Semiprozine

• Beneath Ceaseless Skies
• GUD Magazine
• Interzone
• Locus
• New York Review of Science Fiction

Best Related Work

• The Geek’s Guide to the Galaxy by John Joseph Adams and David Barr Kirtley
• The Business of Science Fiction by Mike Resnick and Barry N. Malzberg
• Sci-Fi Art Now by John Freeman

Best Fanzine

• Argentus
• SF Signal
• The Skiffy and Fanty Show
• StarShipSofa
• The World SF Blog

Best Fan Writer

Note: While I love the fan writings of Dave Langford, Nick Mamatas, John Scalzi and other big name authors, I'm using this award to focus on fan writers who don't usually receive the notice they deserve.

• Ay-leen the Peacemaker
• Michael A. Burstein
• Matthew Cheney
• James Nicoll
• James Oliver

Best Editor, Short Form

• John Joseph Adams (Lightspeed, various anthologies)
• Andy Cox (Interzone)
• Gordon Van Gelder (F&SF)
• Stanley Schmidt (Analog)
• Sheila Williams (Asimov's)

Best Editor, Long Form

Note: It's hard to figure out who qualifies in this category under the arcane Hugo rules, so consider this an attempt to highlight those editors whose books impressed me in 2010.

• David G. Hartwell (Tor Books)
• Patrick Nielsen Hayden (Tor Books)
• Jennifer Hunt (Little, Brown, editor of Ship Breaker)
• Jason Sizemore (Apex Books)
• Paul Stevens (Tor Books)

Best Professional Artist

• Vincent Chong (samples of 2010 work provided here, here, and here)
• Julie Dillon (who created, among other images, this amazing cover for my story "The Never Never Wizard of Apalachicola" in IGMS)
• Warwick Fraser-Coombe (illustrated all the covers for Interzone in 2010; when combined, the covers create this impressive image)
• John Picacio (his illustrations for 2010 can be seen here)

John W. Campbell Award for Best New Writer

• Saladin Ahmed
• Nicky Drayden
• Keffy R. M. Kehrli
• Alastair Mayer
• Ferrett Steinmetz

Locus Only Categories

Best Anthology

• Alembical 2, edited by Arthur Dorrance and Lawrence M. Schoen
• Apex Magazine's special Arab/Muslim themed issue, edited by Catherynne M. Valente
• Dark Faith, edited by Maurice Broaddus and Jerry Gordon Read my review
• Shine: An Anthology of Optimistic SF, edited by Jetse de Vries
• Stories: All-New Tales edited by Neil Gaiman and Al Sarrantonio

Best Collection

• Occultation by Laird Barron
• A Handful of Pearls and Other Stories by Beth Bernobich
• Fritz Leiber: Selected Stories
• The Best of Kim Stanley Robinson
• The Last Hieroglyph (The Collected Fantasies of Clark Ashton Smith, Vol. 5)

Please note I didn't nominate any works in the Hugo categories of dramatic performances, best fan artist, and best graphic story, or in the Nebula's dramatic performance category. Others will have to voice opinions on which nominations belong there.

If anyone sees any mistakes with my nominations—a story in a wrong category, ineligible works—please let me know. I won't officially submit these nominations until early February. In addition, as authors and publishers provide additional links to their works I'll add these to the post.

Comments

[Adambeyoncelowe]

I'm so glad Beth Bernobich is on here (twice!).

[SMD]

Oh, awesome! Thanks for considering our show, Jason. We appreciate it :).

And your other selections are pretty awesome. I haven't read most of them, but I'm horribly behind in the world.

[SF2 Concatenation]

Interesting selection.

No overlap with our best SF books of 2010 (but then maybe we have too much a Brit Isles perspective)
http://www.concatenation.org/news/news1~11.html#best_books

Also you don't do film. Of possible Hugo Dramatic Presentation Lond Form interest
http://www.concatenation.org/news/news1~11.html#best_films

[DGB]

Nice selection. The Hundred Thousand Kingdoms is awesome. The Lifecycle of Software Objects has some interesting ideas but is emotionally flat.

I would add Surface Detail by Ian Banks and Quantum Thief by Hannu Rajaniemi for the best novel, and Pink Noise: A Posthuman Tale by Leonid Korogodski for the best novella:

http://www.pinknoise.net/pdf/PinkNoise-Sample.pdf

[Jason Sanford]

Thanks for the links. Unfortunately, The Quantum Thief by Hannu Rajaniemi won't be available in the U.S. until this year so I'll have to consider it for next year's awards. I'm really looking forward to it.

[Beyondvictoriana]

Thanks so much for recommending my work for Best Fan Writing! I'm flattered (plus, being in the ranks with those other guys--especially James Nicoll--just shorted out my brain for a second there.) ^___^

~ Ay-leen