2016 James Tiptree, Jr. Literary Award

The Winner of the 2016 Tiptree Award has been announced - Anna-Marie McLemore for her novel When the Moon Was Ours (Thomas Dunne Books/St. Martin’s Press, 2016).

Longlisted for the 2016 National Book Award for Young People's Literature
Stonewall Book Award Honor

“McLemore’s second novel is such a lush surprising fable, you half expect birds to fly out of the pages… McLemore uses the supernatural to remind us that the body’s need to speak its truth is primal and profound, and that the connection between two people is no more anyone’s business than why the dish ran away with the spoon.”
--Jeff Giles, New York Times Book Review

Anna-Marie McLemore’s debut novel The Weight of Feathers was greeted with rave reviews, a YALSA Morris Award nomination, and spots on multiple “Best YA Novels” lists. Now, McLemore delivers a second stunning and utterly romantic novel, again tinged with magic.

To everyone who knows them, best friends Miel and Sam are as strange as they are inseparable. Roses grow out of Miel’s wrist, and rumors say that she spilled out of a water tower when she was five. Sam is known for the moons he paints and hangs in the trees and for how little anyone knows about his life before he and his mother moved to town. But as odd as everyone considers Miel and Sam, even they stay away from the Bonner girls, four beautiful sisters rumored to be witches. Now they want the roses that grow from Miel’s skin, convinced that their scent can make anyone fall in love. And they’re willing to use every secret Miel has fought to protect to make sure she gives them up.

Atmospheric, dynamic, and packed with gorgeous prose, When the Moon was Ours

The Tiptree Award Honor List

In addition to selecting the winners, the jury chooses a Tiptree Award Honor List. The Honor List is a strong part of the award’s identity and is used by many readers as a recommended reading list.

To see the excerpted and edited notes on each work by members of this year’s jury click here.

Eleanor Arnason, Hwarhath Stories:Transgressive Tales by Aliens (Aqueduct Press, 2016)

Mishell Baker, Borderline (Saga Press, 2016)

Nino Cipri, “Opals and Clay” (Podcastle, 2016)

Andrea Hairston, Will Do Magic for Small Change (Aqueduct Press, 2016)

Rachael K. Jones, “The Night Bazaar for Women Becoming Reptiles” (Beneath Ceaseless Skies, 2016)

Seanan McGuire, Every Heart a Doorway (Tor Books, 2916)

Ada Palmer, Too Like the Lightning (Tor Books, 2016)

Johanna Sinisalo, The Core of the Sun (Grove Press/Black Cat, 2016)

Nisi Shawl, Everfair (Tor Books, 2016)

In addition to the honor list, this year’s Tiptree Award jury also compiled a long list of twelve other works they found worthy of attention.

All the Birds in the Sky, Charlie Jane Anders (Tor, 2016)

The Waterdancer’s World, L. Timmel Duchamp (Aqueduct Press, 2016)

Lily, Michael Thomas Ford (Lethe Press, 2016)

King of the Worlds, M. Thomas Gammarino (Chin Music Press, 2016)

“Vesp: A History of Sapphic Scaphism,” Porpentine Charity Heartscape (Terraform, 2016 – an online interactive story),

Cantor for Pearls, M.C.A. Hogarth (De La Torre Books, 2016)

The Obelisk Gate, N.K. Jemisin (Orbit, 2016)

An Accident of Stars, Foz Meadows (Angry Robot, 2016)

Sleeping Under the Tree of Life, Sheree Renée Thomas (Aqueduct Press, 2016)

Suddenly Paris, Olga & Christopher Werby (CreateSpace, 2015)

The Arrival of Missives, Aliya Whiteley (Unsung Stories, 2015)

The Natural Way of Things, Charlotte Wood (Europa Editions 2016)

Anna-Marie McLemore, along with authors and works on the Honor List, will be celebrated during Memorial Day weekend at WisCon 41 in Madison, Wisconsin, May 26-29, 2017. She will receive $1000 in prize money, a specially commissioned piece of original artwork, and (as always) chocolate.

Each year, a panel of five jurors selects the Tiptree Award winner. The 2016 judges were Jeanne Gomoll (chair), Aimee Bahng, James Fox, Roxanne Samer, and Deb Taber.

Reading for 2017 will soon begin. The panel consists of Alexis Lothian (chair), E.J. Fischer, Kazue Harada, Cheryl Morgan, and Julia Starkey.

The Tiptree Award invites everyone to recommend works for the award. Please submit recommendations via our recommendation page. Full information on all the books mentioned above will be in the Tiptree Award database before the end of March 2017.