2009 Clarke Award Nominees

Location: Sci-Fi London at the Apollo Piccadilly Circus in London, United Kingdom.

Comments: I've said this before, but the 2009 slate of Clarke Award nominees will make me say it again: The volume of excellent science fiction being produced in recent years has simply been overwhelming. On this ballot I am partial to Neal Stephenson's book Anathem, but that's mostly because I like Stephenson's work. Being perfectly honest, all of the books on this list would have been worthy winners of the award, and probably would have been shoo-in's to win if they had been nominated in earlier decades.

Winner
Song of Time by Ian R. MacLeod

Shortlist
Anathem by Neal Stephenson
House of Suns by Alastair Reynolds
The Margarets by Sheri S. Tepper
Martin Martin's on the Other Side by Mark Wernham
The Quiet War by Paul J. McAuley

What Are the Arthur C. Clarke Awards?

Go to previous year's nominees: 2008
Go to subsequent year's nominees: 2010

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2009 Nebula Award Nominees

Location: Los Angeles, California.

Comments: 2009 was a good year for female authors. The year saw two of my favorite authors - Ursula K. Le Guin and Catherine Asaro, both win Nebula Awards, and also saw Nina Kiriki Hoffman pick up an award as well. The Andre Norton Award went to Ysabeau Wilce. One might think that with four of the six available awards going to works authored by women, that this was a very good year for gender equity.

And for the most part, one would be correct. Most of the award categories had fields of nominees that were more or less evenly balanced between the sexes, with women gaining a very slight edge overall. The field of Andre Norton nominees was dominated by female writers. On the other hand, while Le Guin won the Nebula for Best Novel, she did so against an entirely male field of other nominees and there were no writers among those nominated for the Best Script Award. On the whole, however, 2009 indicates just how far the Nebula Awards had come from the almost exclusively boys' club of the 1960s and 1970s, to being a much more representative and inclusive honor.

Best Novel

Winner:
Powers by Ursula K. Le Guin

Other Nominees:
Brasyl by Ian McDonald
Cauldron by Jack McDevitt
Little Brother by Cory Doctorow
Making Money by Terry Pratchett
Superpowers by David J. Schwartz

Best Novella

Winner:

The Spacetime Pool by Catherine Asaro

Other Nominees:
Dangerous Space by Kelley Eskridge
Dark Heaven by Gregory Benford
The Duke In His Castle by Vera Nazarian
The Political Prisoner by Charles Coleman Finlay

Best Novelette

Winner:

Pride and Prometheus by John Kessel

Other Nominees:
Baby Doll by Johanna Sinisalo, translated by David Hackston
Dark Rooms by Lisa Goldstein
If Angels Fight by Richard Bowes
Kaleidoscope by K.D. Wentworth
Night Wind by Mary Rosenblum
The Ray-Gun: A Love Story by James Alan Gardner

Best Short Story

Winner:
Trophy Wives by Nina Kiriki Hoffman

Other Nominees:
26 Monkeys, Also the Abyss by Kij Johnson
The Button Bin by Mike Allen
Don't Stop by James Patrick Kelly
The Dreaming Wind by Jeffrey Ford
Mars: A Traveler's Guide by Ruth Nestvold
The Tomb Wife by Gwyneth Jones

Best Script

Winner:

WALL-E by Andrew Stanton, Jim Reardon, and Peter Docter

Other Nominees:
The Dark Knight by Jonathan Nolan, Christopher Nolan, and David S. Goyer
Stargate Atlantis: The Shrine by Brad Wright

Andre Norton Award

Winner:

Flora's Dare by Ysabeau S. Wilce

Other Nominees:
The Adoration of Jenna Fox by Mary E. Pearson
Graceling by Kristin Cashore
Monster Blood Tattoo, Book Two: Lamplighter by D.M. Cornish
Savvy by Ingrid Law

Go to previous year's nominees: 2008
Go to subsequent year's nominees: 2010

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