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Two sets of awards finalist lists

Andrew Liptak -

In a bit of keeping-up-with-genre-lit-news, two organizations announced their finalists for their respective book awards this week. I generally view awards as a hit-or-miss-thing (stay tuned for tomorrow's post about some updates around last year's Hugo Awards), but they do make for some good places to find some good books to read if you're looking.

First up, The L.A. Times announced the finalists for its 44th annual L.A. Times Book Awards, which includes a speculative fiction category. Here are the finalists for that category:

*Usual disclaimer: Bookshop.org links are affiliate links.

There are some other books on the list that I was pleased to see make the cut: The Rediscovery of America: Native Peoples and the Unmaking of U.S. History by Ned Blackhawk, which I’ve been picking away at, as well as S.A. Crosby’s All the Sinners Bleed, which I really enjoyed reading last year.

What I like about this list is that it's nicely varied. (Here's last year's finalists). The award seems to have dropped Ray Bradbury from the name of the award. (It was previously sponsored by the Ray Bradbury Foundation, which makes me think that they're not this year?) This year's awards will be announced during this year's L.A. Times Book Festival on April 19th.

Next up is the 2023 Bram Stoker Award finalists from the Horror Writer’s Association, which recognizes “Superior Achievement” in a number of categories. This is a really long list, so I won’t put down the entire thing, but here are the “superior” novels:

This – and the other categories – seem like it's a solid list. Tananarive Due's The Reformatory has really been earning a lot of acclaim since it was published in October, and I have a feeling we haven't seen the last of it yet.

Members of the Horror Writer's Association will now begin voting on the awards, and the winners will be announced during the Annual Bram Stoker Awards Banquet held during StokerCon™ 2024 in San Diego, California.