Other winners: Ellen Asher and Jane Yolen for Life Achievement, Kij Johnson’s “26 Monkeys, Also the Abyss” for Best Short Story, Richard Bowes’s “If Angels Fight” for Best Novella, Sedia Ekaterina’s Paper Cities for Best Anthology, Jeffrey Ford’s The Drowned Life for Best Collection (yep, that’s a two-fer), Kelly Link & Gavin J. Grant’s Small Beer Press and Big Mouth House for Special Award (Professional), and Michael J. Walsh’s Howard Waldrop collections from Old Earth Books for Special Award (Non-professional).

The Tarkine is one of the great temperate rainforests on Earth. It is every bit as majestic as the traditional European forests that so dominate fantasy settings, but is also distinctly alien to anything in the northern hemisphere. As Margo promises, “the giants are not northern ogres but Tarkiner giants: myrtle, gum, sassafras and Huon pine. The birds, reptiles, mammals and insects that thrive in and among them; the fungi, ferns and smaller flora at their feet and in their branches; and the humans who have shared this part of the planet with them for about 30 millennia, will stretch your usual definition of ‘forest’ and ‘coast’, of ‘life’ and ‘society’, in utterly new ways.”

The tour can only accommodate 10 people so book early. Information and bookings here.

The Tarkine wilderness (from Ken’s public Picasa gallery):