I love the Aurealis Awards! Since I first started paying attention to them in the late 90s, I’ve always been interested in the annual shortlists of cool stories/novels by Australian SFF writers. There are so many shortlists, divided by genre. More book love!

This year’s shortlist is here: https://aurealisawards.org/2021/03/31/2020-aurealis-awards-shortlist-announcement/

Judged by panels of experts who volunteer their time to read everything they are sent in their category, the various shortlists are independent which means books and stories can sometimes appear in multiple places, if they’ve impressed more than one panel! This year, I note that Thoraiya Dyer’s novella Generation Gap (Clarkesworld) appears on both the SF and Fantasy novella lists! I’m always delighted for works that represent multiple genres.

It’s also interesting to me to get a sense for the breadth and variety of publishers who are publishing and distributing the work of Australian authors — especially to see how much work was published here vs. overseas. I was a judge this year on the Science Fiction Novel category (so it’s the only one I knew about before the list was released!) and one of the exciting thing about our shortlist is that it features 6 books from 5 different publishers — a sign of health in the industry! The days of all the Fantasy novels being from HarperCollins are behind us.

I had four nominations this year, which is delightful and pleasing. Three of my four titles are self-published… and they seem to be the only books listed as self-published on the shortlist this year, though it may be that they’re just the only books self-published by an author who hasn’t come up with a cool name for her own publishing imprint yet… anyway, my point is that self-publishing often hits a wall with distribution. Many popular awards, you have no chance at if your books aren’t widely distributed in (cough, US) bookshops for a general readership. Because not enough people have read them in order to nominate.

With the AAs, though, if you submit your works, chances are high the judges will read them, which puts self–published work and the small presses on an equal footing with Big Name Publishers. And I have to say, given how easy it is to fall for impostor syndrome when you publish your own work… award nominations from panels of your peers can feel incredibly gratifying.

Here are the stories!

“Kids These Days” in Rebuilding Tomorrow (Twelfth Planet Press) – a tale of anxiety and the mentorship of teenagers in a post-apocalyptic society. (nominated for Best Young Adult Short Story)

The Frost Fair Affair (self-published) – a cozy mystery of Regency magic, palace espionage and flirting on sleigh-rides. (nominated for Best Fantasy Novella)

Castle Charming (self-published) – a collection/mosaic novel about disaster princes and royal romance in a fairy tale mash-up world. (nominated for Best Collection)

Unreal Alchemy (self-published) – a collection/mosaic novel about students at an Australian magic university, and their various shenanigans around a geeky rock band. (nominated for Best Collection)

Shout out for both Rebuilding Tomorrow and Unnatural Order, fabulous anthologies I had stories in, for their Best Anthology nominations. And huge congratulations to all of the nominees in every category. It’s so lovely to be part of such a huge celebration of Australian SFF.