Celebrating Australian Short Spec Fic at Swancon; and Bloodlines ed. Amanda Pillar wins an Aurealis Award

 Australian short spec-fic panel: a celebration

Where: Swan Con Panel at the Pan Pacific Hotel

When:  8:30 - 9:30 Easter Sunday

Panelists: Anthony Panegyres, Liz Grzyb, Stephen Dedman, Guy Salvidge, Leonard Goulds

I'm both host and a panelist in this celebration of short spec-fic down under. We'll have great book giveaways, including Aurealis Award winning and short-listed anthologies. I anticipate that like last year we'll have an audience led discussion. We'll most likely cover recommended reads, recommended writers, the market, the craft, the submission process, payment, publication houses and journals. The list goes on. Come along for an informative and fun night. Feel free to field questions too - we encourage it.

Bloodlines ed. Amanda Pillar wins the Aurealis Award for Best Anthology!

Bloodlines ed. Amanda Pillar (which I've a story in) won the best anthology category at the Aurealis Awards!

Here's the impressive list of world-class finalists:

Hear Me Roar, Liz Grzyb (ed.) (Ticonderoga Publications)

The Year’s Best Australian Fantasy and Horror 2014, Liz Grzyb and Talie Helene (eds.) (Ticonderoga Publications)

Bloodlines, Amanda Pillar (ed.) (Ticonderoga Publications)

Meeting Infinity, Jonathan Strahan (ed.), (Solaris)

The Best Science Fiction and Fantasy of the Year: Volume 9, Jonathan Strahan (ed.) (Solaris)

Focus 2014: highlights of Australian short fiction, Tehani Wessely (ed.) (FableCroft Publishing)


Congrats to Amanda Pillar along with the 16 writers, who all contributed to the award:

• Joanne Anderton "Unnamed Children"
• Alan Baxter "Old Promise New Blood"
• Nathan Burrage "The Ties of Blood, Hair and Bone"
• Dirk Flinthart "In The Blood"
• Rebecca Fung "In the Heart of the City"
• Stephanie Gunn "The Flowers That Bloom Where Blood Touches Earth"
• Kelly Hoolihan "The Stone and the Sheath"
• Kathleen Jennings "The Tangled Streets"
• Pete Kempshall "Azimuth"
• Martin Livings "A Red Mist"
• Seanan McGuire "Into the Green" (also writes as Mira Grant)
• Anthony Panegyres "Lady Killer"
• Jane Percival "The Mysterious Mr Montague"
• Paul Starkey "The Tenderness of Monsters"
• Lyn Thorne-Adder "Lifeblood of the City"
• S. Zanne "Seeing Red"

The complete Aurealis Award Winning List is below (congrats again to all the winners and finalists). Here in Perth we had a fantastic time at the Pan Pacific Hotel, where the great gang at Swancon had it streamed live from Brisbane on a big screen (with food and alcohol catered for). Wonderful night and it felt as if we were almost there.

BEST CHILDREN’S FICTION
A Single Stone, Meg McKinlay (Walker Books Australia) 

BEST GRAPHIC NOVEL / ILLUSTRATED WORK
The Singing Bones, Shaun Tan (Allen & Unwin)                  

BEST YOUNG ADULT SHORT STORY
“The Miseducation of Mara Lys”, Deborah Kalin (Cherry Crow Children, Twelfth Planet Press)

BEST HORROR SHORT STORY
“Bullets”, Joanne Anderton (In Sunshine Bright and Darkness Deep, AHWA)

BEST HORROR NOVELLA
“The Miseducation of Mara Lys”, Deborah Kalin (Cherry Crow Children, Twelfth Planet Press) 

BEST FANTASY SHORT STORY
“The Giant’s Lady”, Rowena Cory Daniells (Legends 2, Newcon Press) 

BEST FANTASY NOVELLA
“Defy the Grey Kings”, Jason Fischer (Beneath Ceaseless Skies, Firkin Press) 

BEST SCIENCE FICTION SHORT STORY
“All the Wrong Places”, Sean Williams (Meeting Infinity, Solaris)

BEST SCIENCE FICTION NOVELLA
“By Frogsled and Lizardback to Outcast Venusian Lepers”, Garth Nix (Old Venus, Random House)

BEST COLLECTION
To Hold the Bridge, Garth Nix (Allen & Unwin) 

BEST ANTHOLOGY
Bloodlines, Amanda Pillar (ed.) (Ticonderoga Publications) 

BEST YOUNG ADULT NOVEL
In The Skin of a Monster, Kathryn Barker (Allen & Unwin) 

BEST HORROR NOVEL
Day Boy,Trent Jamieson (Text Publishing)

BEST FANTASY NOVEL
Day Boy,Trent Jamieson (Text Publishing) 

BEST SCIENCE FICTION NOVEL
Illuminae, Amie Kaufman and Jay Kristoff (Allen & Unwin) 

SARA DOUGLASS BOOK SERIES AWARD
The Watergivers [The Last Stormlord (2009), Stormlord Rising (2010), Stormlord’s Exile (2011)], Glenda Larke (HarperVoyager)

THE CONVENORS’ AWARD FOR EXCELLENCE
Letters to Tiptree, Alexandra Pierce and Alisa Krasnostein (Twelfth Planet Press)