The Horror Writers Association (HWA) announced their final ballot for this year’s Bram Stoker Awards for Superior Achievement. From this ballot, the members of HWA will choose the nominees to appear on the final ballot, and then they’ll vote on that ballot to determine the winners, which will be announced at the World Horror Convention on 29 March in Salt Lake City, Utah (the convention runs 27-30 March).
They’ve also announced that they’ll be giving two Lifetime Achievement Awards at this year’s awards banquet: to John Carpenter and Robert Weinberg.
Writer/director/producer/composer John Carpenter exploded onto the horror scene with his 1978 classic Halloween, a film that held the title of most successful independent release for two decades. His other notable films include The Thing, The Fog, Escape from New York, In the Mouth of Madness, and Vampires, as well as many others. Carpenter has come to be known as one of the most influential horror filmmakers of all time. He is currently in production on his newest project, called The Prince.
In 1967, Robert Weinberg sold his first short story. He was a junior in college at the time, and hasn’t stopped writing since. A founding member of HWA, Weinberg is a two-time winner of World Fantasy Award and a renowned expert in many genres, having edited over 100 books in the fields of horror, fantasy, science fiction, young adult, western, and mystery. Weinberg also has worked as a writing instructor and served as HWA vice president for two terms.
The other award winners will be chosen from the final ballot, which is:
Superior Achievement in a Novel:
The Guardener’s Tale by Bruce Boston (published by Sam’s Dot)
Heart-Shaped Box by Joe Hill (William Morrow)
The Missing by Sarah Langan (Harper)
The Witch’s Trinity by Erika Mailman (Crown)
The Terror by Dan Simmons (Little, Brown)
Superior Achievement in a First Novel:
I Will Rise by Michael Louis Calvillo (Lachesis Publishing)
Heart-Shaped Box by Joe Hill (William Morrow)
The Memory Tree by John R. Little (Nocturne Press)
The Hollower by Mary SanGiovanni (Leisure Books)
Superior Achievement in Long Fiction:
“Afterward, there will be a Hallway” by Gary Braunbeck (Five Strokes to Midnight)
“Almost the Last Story by Almost the Last Man” by Scott Edelman (Postscripts)
General Slocum’s Gold by Nicholas Kaufmann (Burning Effigy Press)
“The Tenth Muse” by William Browning Spencer (Subterranean #6)
“An Apiary of White Bees” by Lee Thomas (Inferno)
Superior Achievement in Short Fiction:
“The Death Wagon Rolls On By” by C. Dean Andersson (Cemetery Dance #57)
“Letting Go” by John Everson (Needles and Sins)
“The Teacher” by Paul G. Tremblay (Chizine)
“There’s No Light Between Floors” by Paul G. Tremblay (Clarkesworld)
“Closet Dreams” by Lisa Tuttle (Postscripts #10)
“The Gentle Brush of Wings” by David Niall Wilson (Defining Moments)
Superior Achievement in an Anthology:
Five Strokes to Midnight edited by Gary Braunbeck and Hank Schwaeble (Haunted Pelican Press)
Inferno edited by Ellen Datlow (Tor)
Dark Delicacies 2: Fear edited by Del Howison & Jeff Gelb (Carroll & Graf/Avalon)
Midnight Premiere edited by Tom Piccirilli (Cemetery Dance Publications)
At Ease with the Dead edited by Barbara & Christopher Roden (Ash-Tree Press)
Superior Achievement in a Collection:
Proverbs for Monsters by Michael A. Arnzen (Dark Regions Press)
The Imago Sequence by Laird Barron (Night Shade Books)
Old Devil Moon by Christopher Fowler (Serpent’s Tail)
5 Stories by Peter Straub (Borderlands)
Defining Moments by David Niall Wilson (Sarob Press)
Superior Achievement in Nonfiction:
Encyclopedia Horrifica by Joshue Gee (Scholastic)
The Portable Obituary: How the Famous, Rich and Powerful Really Died by Michael Largo (Harper)
The Cryptopedia: A Dictionary of the Weird, Strange & Downright Bizarre by Jonathan Maberry & David F. Kramer (Citadel Press / Kensington)
Storytellers Unplugged by Joe Nassise and David Niall Wilson (Storytellers Unplugged)
Superior Achievement in Poetry:
“Being Full of Light, Insubstantial” by Linda Addison (Space and Time)
“Heresy” by Charlee Jacob (Bedlam Press)
“Vectors: A Week in the Death of a Planet” by Charlee Jacob & Marge Simon (Dark Regions Press)
“Phantasmapedia” by Mark McLaughlin (Dead Letter Press)
“Ossuary” by JoSelle Vanderhooft (Sam’s Dot Publishing)
This article updates this previous article, which announced the preliminary ballot.