2018 Ditmar Preliminary Ballot

The preliminary ballot for the Australian SF ("Ditmar") Awards for 2018 has been announced. The Ditmar Awards will be awarded at the 2018 Australian National SF Convention, Swancon 43 in Perth (March 29 – April 2, 2018).


Best Novel

• Corpselight, Angela Slatter, Hachette Australia.
• Crossroads of Canopy, Thoraiya Dyer, Tor.
• How to Bee, Bren McDibble, Allen & Unwin.
• In the Dark Spaces, Cally Black, Hardie Grant Egmont.
• Lotus Blue, Cat Sparks, Skyhorse Publishing.

Best Novella or Novelette

• "Island Green", Shauna O'Meara, in Ecopunk! Ticonderoga Publications.
• "Girl Reporter", Tansy Rayner Roberts, in Girl Reporter, Book Smugglers Publishing.
• "Matters Arising from the Identification of the Body", Simon Petrie, in Matters Arising from the Identification of the Body, Peggy Bright Books.
• "Monkey Business", Janeen Webb, in Ecopunk!, Ticonderoga Publications.
• "My Sister's Ghost", Kate Forsyth and Kim Wilkins, in The Silver Well, Ticonderoga Publications.

Best Short Story

• "A Harem of Six Legs", Edwina Harvey, in An Eclectic Collection of Stuff and Things, Peggy Bright Books.
• "Mr Mycelium", Claire McKenna, in Ecopunk!, Ticonderoga Publications.
• "A Pearl Beyond Price", Janeen Webb in Cthulhu Deep Down-Under Vol 1, IFWG Publishing Australia.
• "Prayers to Broken Stone", Cat Sparks, in Kaleidotrope, Spring 2017.
• "Trivalent" by Rivqa Rafael, in Ecopunk!, Ticonderoga Publications.

Best Collected Work

• An Eclectic Collection of Stuff and Things by Edwina Harvey, Peggy Bright Books.
• Ecopunk!, Cat Sparks and Liz Grzyb, Ticonderoga Publications.
• The Silver Well, Kate Forsyth and Kim Wilkins, Ticonderoga Publications.
• Singing My Sister Down and other stories by Margo Lanagan, Allen & Unwin.

Best Artwork

• cover art, Lewis Morley, for Matters Arising from the Identification of the Body, Peggy Bright Books.
• The Grief Hole Illustrated: An Artist's Sketchbook Companion to Kaaron Warren's Supernatural Thriller, Keely Van Order, IFWG Publishing Australia.

Best Fan Publication in Any Medium

• Earl Grey Editing (blog), Elizabeth Fitzgerald.
• Galactic Suburbia, Alisa Krasnostein, Alexandra Pierce, Tansy Rayner Roberts.
• No Award (blog), Liz Barr and Stephanie Lai.
• SF Commentary, edited by Bruce Gillespie.
• The Writer and the Critic, Kirstyn McDermott and Ian Mond.

Best Fan Writer

• Liz Barr, for writing at No Award.
• Leigh Edmonds, for writing in iOTA.
• Elizabeth Fitzgerald, for writing at Earl Grey Editing.
• Stephanie Lai, for writing at No Award.

Best Fan Artist

• Shauna O'Meara, for "How to Bee" (based on the novel by Bren MacDibble).

Best New Talent

• Clarie G. Coleman
• Stephanie Lai

William Atheling Jr Award for Criticism or Review

• Liz Barr, for Star Trek: Discovery reviews, in No Award.
• Russell Blackford, for Science Fiction and the Moral Imagination, Springer.
• Ambelin Kwaymullina, for "Reflecting on Indigenous Worlds, Indigenous Futurisms and Artificial Intelligence", Twelfth Planet Press.
• Alexandra Pierce and Mimi Mondal, for Luminescent Threads: Connections to Octavia E. Butler, Twelfth Planet Press.
• Cat Sparks, for "Science fiction and climate fiction: contemporary literatures of purpose", in Ecopunk! Speculative tales of radical futures, Ticonderoga Publications.