2006 Prometheus Award Nominees

Location: LAcon IV in Anaheim, California.

Comments: Yet again, when confronted with a situation indicating that their award structure was inadequate to the task of honoring the full range of libertarian works that their members thought worthy, the Libertarian Futurist Society resorted to the ad hoc means of handing out a special award rather than actually trying to fix the categories of the Prometheus Awards to keep them current with the realities of modern media. I suppose that this isn't unexpected for the reactionary organization that the Libertarian Futurist Society seems to have become, and handing out ad hoc awards reflect the chaotic nature of the libertarian ideology to a certain extent. This does, however, expose the Prometheus Awards as being something of a disorganized mess.

Best Novel

Winner:

Learning the World by Ken MacLeod

Other Nominees:

47 by Walter Mosley

The Black Arrow by Vin Suprynowicz
Chainfire by Terry Goodkind
The Hidden Family by Charles Stross
RebelFire: Out of the Gray Zone by Claire Wolfe and Aaron Zelman

Hall of Fame

Winner:

V for Vendetta by Alan Moore and David Lloyd

Other Nominees:
As Easy as A.B.C. by Rudyard Kipling
A Clockwork Orange by Anthony Burgess
It Can't Happen Here by Sinclair Lewis

The Lord of the Rings (The Fellowship of the Ring, The Two Towers, and The Return of the King) by J.R.R. Tolkien

Special Award

Winner:

Serenity by Joss Whedon

Other Nominees:
None

Go to previous year's nominees: 2005
Go to subsequent year's nominees: 2007

Book Award Reviews     Home

2006 Hugo Award Finalists

Location: L.A. Con IV in Anaheim, California.

Comments: Partially making up for its woefully short run on network television, and its snubbing in previous Hugo ceremonies, the Firefly universe got a nod in 2006 when the movie Serenity won the Hugo for Best Dramatic Presentation: Long Form. While I am sure that most Browncoats would have preferred a long run as a broadcast program, the nod from the Hugo voters was nice.

Meanwhile, over in the Short Form category, the revamped Doctor Who show began its run of dominating the award with a win for the two part story The Empty Child and The Doctor Dances. Over the next six years, Doctor Who would go on to win five of the Short Form Hugo Awards, a run interrupted only by Dr. Horrible's Sing Along Blog. Granted, Doctor Who is a very good show, but it seems to me to be quite unhealthy for the Hugo Awards, and for science fiction as a televised genre, to have a single program dominating an award category like this.

Best Novel

Winner:
Spin by Robert Charles Wilson

Other Finalists:
Accelerando by Charles Stross
A Feast for Crows by George R.R. Martin
Learning the World by Ken MacLeod
Old Man's War by John Scalzi

Best Novella

Winner:

Inside Job by Connie Willis

Other Finalists:
Burn by James Patrick Kelly
Identity Theft by Robert J. Sawyer (reviewed in Red Planet Blues)
The Little Goddess by Ian McDonald
Magic for Beginners by Kelly Link

Best Novelette

Winner:

Two Hearts by Peter S. Beagle

Other Finalists:
The Calorie Man by Paolo Bacigalupi
I, Robot by Cory Doctorow
The King of Where-I-Go by Howard Waldrop
TelePresence by Michael A. Burstein

Best Short Story

Winner:

Tk'tk'tk by David D. Levine

Other Finalists:
The Clockwork Atom Bomb by Dominic Green
Down Memory Lane by Mike Resnick
Seventy-Five Years by Michael A. Burstein
Singing My Sister Down by Margo Lanagan

Best Nonfiction, Related, or Reference Work

Winner:

Storyteller: Writing Lessons and More from 27 Years of the Clarion Writers' Workshop by Kate Wilhelm

Other Finalists:
Science Fiction Quotations by Gary Westfahl
The SEX Column and Other Misprints by David Langford
Soundings: Reviews 1992-1996 by Gary K. Wolfe

Transformations: The Story of the Science-Fiction Magazines from 1950 to 1970 by Mike Ashley

Best Dramatic Presentation: Long Form

Winner:
Serenity

Other Finalists:
Batman Begins
The Chronicles of Narnia: The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe
Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire
Wallace & Gromit in the Curse of the Were-Rabbit

Best Dramatic Presentation: Short Form

Winner:
Doctor Who: The Empty Child and The Doctor Dances

Other Finalists:
Battlestar Galactica: Pegasus
Doctor Who: Dalek
Doctor Who: Father's Day
Jack-Jack Attack
Lucas Back in Anger
Prix Victor Hugo Awards Ceremony: Opening Speech and Framing Device

Best Professional Editor

Winner:
David G. Hartwell

Other Finalists:
Ellen Datlow
Stanley Schmidt
Gordon van Gelder
Sheila Williams

Best Professional Artist

Winner:
Donato Giancola

Other Finalists:
Jim Burns
Bob Eggleton
Stephan Martiniere
John Picacio
Michael Whelan

Best Semi-Prozine

Winner:

Locus edited by Charles N. Brown, Kirsten Gong-Wong, and Liza Groen Trombi

Other Finalists:
Ansible edited by David Langford
Emerald City edited by Cheryl Morgan
Interzone edited by Andy Cox

The New York Review of Science Fiction edited by Kathryn Cramer, Kevin Maroney, and David G. Hartwell

Best Fanzine

Winner:

Plokta edited by Steve Davies, Alison Scott, and Mike Scott

Other Finalists:
Banana Wings edited by Claire Brialey and Mark Plummer
Challenger edited by Guy H. Lillian, III
Chunga edited by Randy Byers, Andy Hooper, and Carl Juarez
File 770 edited by Mike Glyer

Best Fan Writer

Winner:

Dave Langford

Other Finalists:
Claire Brialey
John Hertz
Cheryl Morgan
Steven H Silver

Best Fan Artist

Winner:

Frank Wu

Other Finalists:
Brad Foster
Teddy Harvia
Sue Mason
Steve Stiles

John W. Campbell Award for Best New Writer

Winner:
John Scalzi

Other Finalists:
K.J. Bishop
Sarah Monette
Chris Roberson
Brandon Sanderson
Steph Swainston

What Are the Hugo Awards?

Go to previous year's nominees: 2005
Go to subsequent year's nominees: 2007

2006 Hugo Longlist     Book Award Reviews     Home

2006 Mythopoeic Award Nominees

Location: Mythcon XXXVII in Norman, Oklahoma.

Comments: In 2006 the date and location of the Mythopoeic Awards finally became permanently publicly available. As I have noted before, I suspect that  the Mythopoeic Awards were handed out at the annual Mythcon run by the Mythopoeic Society in previous years, but as I cannot find any confirmation of this, I am hesitant to list the annual ballot of nominees with this information. However, in 2006 and later years, this fact has been made explicit, and as a result, I can include the data.

Best Adult Fantasy Literature

Winner:
Anansi Boys by Neil Gaiman

Other Nominees:

The Hallowed Hunt by Lois McMaster Bujold

Metallic Love by Tanith Lee
The Penelopiad by Margaret Atwood
The Strange Adventures of Rangergirl by Tim Pratt

Best Children's Fantasy Literature

Winner:

The Bartimaeus Trilogy (The Amulet of Samarkand, The Golem's Eye, and Ptolemy's Gate) by Jonathan Stroud

Other Nominees:

By These Ten Bones by Clare B. Dunkle

Valiant by Holly Black
Wizards at War by Diane Duane

Scholarship Award in Inklings Studies

Winner:

The Lord of the Rings: A Reader's Companion by Wayne G. Hammond and Christina Scull

Other Nominees:
Interrupted Music: The Making of Tolkien's Mythology by Verlyn Flieger
The Narnian: The Life and Imagination of C.S. Lewis by Alan Jacobs
Perilous Realms: Celtic and Norse in Tolkien's Middle-Earth by Marjorie Burns
Smith of Wootton Major: Expanded Edition edited by Verlyn Flieger

Myth and Fantasy Studies

Winner:

National Dreams: The Remaking of Fairy Tales in Nineteenth-Century England by Jennifer Schacker

Other Nominees:

The Dharma of Dragons and Daemons: Buddhist Themes in Modern Fantasy by David R. Loy and Linda Goodhew

The Meanings of "Beauty and the Beast": A Handbook by Jerry Griswold

Readers in Wonderland: The Liberating Worlds of Fantasy Fiction from Dorothy to Harry Potter by Deborah O'Keefe

Go to previous year's nominees: 2005
Go to subsequent year's nominees: 2007

Book Award Reviews     Home