While the World Fantasy Awards are indeed a judged/juried award, two of the nominations are decided by these votes. There's been some good suggestions from John Klima in recent years (here's his 2008 and 2009 posts) as to the Life Achievement category. (Note that Terry Pratchett was one of those awarded last year.) In individual categories, while my previous posts on local and regional eligibility for the Hugo awards stand fairly well, they are not sorted specifically for fantasy. So I'll do a quick run-down of those:
NOVEL:
- David Drake, The Legions of Fire (Tor)
- Clay and Susan Griffith, The Greyfriar: Vampire Empire, Book 1 (Pyr)
- Mary Robinette Kowal, Shades of Milk and Honey (Tor)
- Warren Rochelle, The Called (Golden Gryphon)
- Tim Akers, The Horns of Ruin (Pyr)
- Richard Dansky, "Mad Eyes of the Heron King" in Dark Faith (Apex)
- Michael Jasper and Jay Lake, "Devil on the Wind" in Black Gate 2010
- Kij Johnson, "Ponies" at Tor.com
- James Maxey, "Where Their Worm Dieth Not" in Masked (Simon & Schuster) and "Greatshadow" in Blood & Devotion
And in terms of what was published in Bull Spec itself which falls under the fantasy umbrella, all in the short story category:
- C.S. Fuqua, "Rise Up" in Bull Spec #1
- Uri Grey, "The Sad Story of the Naga" in Bull Spec #2
- Kaolin Fire, "By the Dragon's Tail" in Bull Spec #2
- Lavie Tidhar, "The Story of Listener and Yu-En" in Bull Spec #3
- Katherine Sparrow, "Like Parchment in the Fire" in Bull Spec #3
- David Tallerman, "The Burning Room" in Bull Spec #4
- Nick Mamatas, "Oh, Harvard Square!" in Bull Spec #4
And while it's silly for me to think of myself as a source of recommendations, I would mention a few things from outside of the local area that I've read this year and might warrant your consideration. First, in the COLLECTION category: Jeff VanderMeer's The Third Bear (Tachyon). In the ANTHOLOGY category: Swords and Dark Magic edited by Jonathan Strahan and Lou Anders, as well as Panverse Two edited by Dario Ciriello, and Stories edited by Neil Gaiman and Al Sarrantonio. In the NOVEL category: Nnedi Okorafor's Who Fears Death (DAW), Catherynne Valente's The Habitation of the Blessed (Night Shade), and Dexter Palmer's The Dream of Perpetual Motion (St. Martin's). And in the NOVELLA category: Paolo Bacigalupi's "The Alchemist" in The Alchemist and the Executionness (Audible.com), Alan Smales' "A Clash of Eagles" in Panverse Two, and "Lightbringers and Rainmakers" by Felix Gilman at Tor.com. Lastly, though there are plenty of reading lists out there, in the SHORT STORY category, J.M. McDermott's "Dedalus and the Labyrinth" in Weird Tales, Spring 2010 is one I haven't seen on too many, and having seen (and heard) him read the story, I was quite pulled in.
Lastly, if you enjoyed Bull Spec last year, the category "Special Award: Non-professional" would be the place to mention it. I would also like to tip my hat in that category toward Dario Ciriello for Panverse Publishing, who continues to inspire me with his excellent all-novella series. I will keep my other "Non-professional" and "Special Award: Professional" votes largely to myself, as yet more name dropping becomes nobody, but Nick Mamatas (for Haikasoru, and for editing the Haunted Legends (with Ellen Datlow) anthology) is someone who hasn't been nominated in the "Professional" category before whose work this year is worth a look.
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