Finalists for the Inaugural Ignyte Awards Announced

The finalists for the inaugural Ignyte Awards have been announced by the FIYAHCON 2020 committee.

The awards seek to celebrate the vibrancy and diversity of the current and future landscapes of science fiction, fantasy, and horror by recognizing incredible feats in storytelling and outstanding efforts toward inclusivity of the genre.

Public voting on the awards is now open through September 11, 2020, 11.59 pm ET on the FIYAHCON website.

Best Novel — Adult

• Kingdom of Copper, SA Chakraborty (Harper Voyager)
• The Dragon Republic, RF Kuang (Harper Voyager)
• Jade War, Fonda Lee (Orbit)
• Gods of Jade and Shadow, Silvia Moreno-Garcia (Del Rey)
• Storm of Locusts, Rebecca Roanhorse (Saga)

Best Novel — YA

• Everlasting Rose, Dhonielle Clayton (Freeform)
• Pet, Akwaeke Emezi (Make Me a World)
• We Hunt the Flame, Hafsah Faizal (FSG)
• Slay, Brittney Morris (Simon Pulse)
• War Girls, Tochi Onyebuchi (Razorbill)

Best in MG for works intended for the middle grade audience

• Sal and Gabi Break the Universe, Carlos Hernandez (Disney Hyperion)
• The Mystwick School of Musicraft, Jessica Khoury (Audible/HMH)
• Tristan Strong Punches a Hole in the Sky, Kwame Mbalia (Disney Hyperion)
• Just South of Home, Karen Strong (Simon & Schuster)
• Other Words for Home, Jasmine Warga (Balzer + Bray)

Best Novella

• The Haunting of Tram Car 015, P Djèlí Clark (Tor.com Publishing)
• This Is How You Lose the Time War, Max Gladstone & Amal El-Mohtar (Saga)
• The Gurkha and the Lord of Tuesday, Saad Z Hossain (Tor.com Publishing)
• The Deep, Rivers Solomon, Daveed Diggs, William Hutson & Jonathan Snipes (Saga)
• The Survival of Molly Southbourne, Tade Thompson (Tor.com Publishing)

Best Novelette

• “While Dragons Claim the Sky”, Jen Brown (Fiyah Spring ’19)
• “Omphalos”, Ted Chiang (Exhalation)
• “Emergency Skin”, N.K. Jemisin (Forward)
• “Circus Girl, The Hunter, and Mirror Boy”, JY Neon Yang (Tor.com 1/30/19)
• “The Archronology of Love”, Caroline Yoachim (Lightspeed 4/19)

Best Short Story

• “Canst Thou Draw Out the Leviathan”, Christopher Caldwell (Uncanny 5-6/19)
• “Dune Song”, Suyi Davies Okungbowa (Apex 5/7/19)
• “And Now His Lordship Is Laughing”, Shiv Ramdas (Strange Horizons 9/9/19)
• “A Brief Lesson in Native American Astronomy”, Rebecca Roanhorse (The Mythic Dream)
• “Ten Excerpts from an Annotated Bibliography on the Cannibal Women of Ratnabar Island”, Nibedita Sen (Nightmare 5/19)

Best in Speculative Poetry

• “Those Who Tell the Stories”, Davian Aw (Strange Horizons 10/7/19)
• “A Conversation Between the Embalmed Heads of Lampião and Maria Bonita on Public Display at the Baiano State Forensic Institute, Circa Mid-20th Century”, Woody Dismukes (Strange Horizons 9/30/19)
• “goddess in forced repose”, Tamara Jerée (Uncanny 9-10/19)
• “Elegy for the Self as Villeneuve’s Beast”, Brandon O’Brien (Uncanny 5-6/19)
• “Heaven Is Expensive”, Ruben Reyes, Jr. (Strange Horizons 10/14/19)

Critics Award

• Liz Bourke
• Alex Brown (Tor.com)
• Maria Haskins
• Jesse (Bowties & Books)
• Charles Payseur (Quick Sip Reviews)

Best Fiction Podcast

• Obsidian Podcast, Adetola Abdulkadir & Safiyah Cheatam
• PodCastle, Jen R Albert, Cherae Clark, Khaalidah Muhammad-Ali, Setsu Uzume & Peter Adrian Behravesh
• Beneath Ceaseless Skies, Scott H. Andrews, ed.
• LeVar Burton Reads, LeVar Burton
• Nightlight Podcast, Tonia Thompson

Best Artist

• Geneva Bowers
• Grace P. Fong
• Paul Lewin
• Nilah Magruder
• John Picacio

Best Comics Team

• Blackbird Vol. 1, Sam Humphries, Jen Bartel & Triona Farrell (Image)
• Excellence, Khary Randolph, Brandon Thomas, Emilio Lopez & Deron Bennett (Image)
• Coda, Simon Spurrier, Matías Bergara, Michael Doig, Jim Campbell & Colin Bell (BOOM!)
• These Savage Shores, Ram V, Sumit Kumar, Vitorio Astone, Aditya Bidikar & Tim Daniel (Vault)
• Bitter Root, David F. Walker, Chuck Brown & Sanford Greene (Image)

Best Anthology / Collected Works

• This Place: 150 Years Retold, Kateri Akiwenzie-Damm, et al. (HighWater)
• A People’s Future of the United States, Victor LaValle & John Joseph Adams, eds. (One World)
• Broken Stars: Contemporary Chinese Fiction in Translation, Ken Liu, ed. (Tor)
• The Mythic Dream, Dominik Parisien & Navah Wolfe, eds. (Saga)
• New Suns: Original Speculative Fiction by People of Color, Nisi Shawl, ed. (Solaris)

Best in Creative Nonfiction

• “Tongue-Tied: A Catalog of Losses”, Layla Al-Bedawi (Fireside 1/17/19)
• Our Opinions are Correct, Charlie Jane Anders & Annalee Newitz
• “Black Horror Rising”, Tananarive Due (Uncanny 5-6/19)
• AfroSurrealism: The African Diaspora’s Surrealist Fiction, Rochelle Spencer (Routledge)
• The Dark Fantastic, Ebony Elizabeth Thomas (NYU Press)

The Ember Award for unsung contributions to genre

• LeVar Burton
• Keidra Chaney
• Tananarive Due
• Malon Edwards
• Nisi Shawl

The Community Award for Outstanding Efforts in Service of Inclusion and Equitable Practice in Genre

• Mary Robinette Kowal
• Beth Phelan
• Diana M Pho
• Strange Horizons
• Writing the Other