In the previous post, I didn’t list the honorable mentions. They deserve to be posted.

Horror short story honourable mentions

• Jacinta Butterworth, “Love Affair”
• Dirk Flinthart, “One Night Stand”
• Margo Lanagan, “Under Hell, Over Heaven”
• A.M. Muffaz, “Mosquito Story”

Fantasy novel honorable mentions

• Kylie Chan, White Tiger
• Lian Hearn, Harsh Cry of the Heron

Fantasy short story honorable mentions

• Lily Chrywenstrom, “Ghosts of 1930″
• Carol Ryles, “The Bridal Bier”

Comments follow on the big winners, the new faces, the peculiarities, and one outrageous prediction…

Big winners

Margo Lanagan with five nominations and an honorable mention has been given a rap for her consistently brilliant work. Also impressive are Kaaron Warren’s two nominations and Sean Williams’s two nominations (one shared with Shane Dix). Lee Battersby’s “Dark Ages” appears on both the science fiction and the fantasy shortlists, which is bound to raise some definitional arguments.

Some editors have done very well, too. Jonathan Strahan and Jeremy Byrne’s Eidolon I anthology racked up five nominations and an honorable mention (the same as Margo Lanagan!). Cat Spark’s Agog! Ripping Reads has two nominated stories. Among the big publishers Penguin, HarperCollins, Allen & Unwin, ABC Books, and Random House all drew multiple nominations.

New faces and old hands

On debut, we have Grace Dugan’s novel The Silver Road, D.M. Cornish’s Monster Blood Tattoo, Amanda Holohan’s Perry Brightfield: The King’s Fool and in short fiction, Jacinta Butterworth’s “Love Affair.” Previously published writers stepping up to a new level include A. M. Muffaz and David Conyers. At the other end of the scale, Sean Williams has now amassed an astonishing nineteen Aurealis nominations. On average, that’s nearly two nominations a year since the award began. Bastard.

(Appendix: Stephen Campisi is also a new writer. Thanks to Ben Peek for the tip.)

Strange decisions

Why is Simon Brown’s “Leviathan” a Young Adult story? The protagonist is a young man, to be sure, but then that’s also true of Lord of the Flies. It’s equally puzzling to see Shaun Tan’s The Arrival listed as a Young Adult short story. It has no words. It is 128 pages long. It is not especially YA. It ought to be among the fantasy novels.

My outrageous prediction

Shaun Tan’s The Arrival to lose in the YA short fiction award — only to win the Peter MacNamara Convenors’ Award at the end of the night.