The Kitschies is an award unlike any other within the SFF Genre. Unlike so many others, this isn’t a popularity contest, it isn’t about who has the most fans, there are no marketing tactics involved by the publishers. Rather, the award takes great care to promote the books that the expert judges consider the year’s most progressive, intelligent and entertaining science fiction.
Patrick Rothfuss, Peter V. Brett or Brandon Sanderson are very unlikely to win a Kitschie… Not because they are not great authors, but because their success relies on fantasy’s heritage. When you look at the previous winners of the Kitschies awards, you begin to see the kind of work they look for:
2011 Winner: A Monster Calls by Patrick Ness and Siobhan Dowd
2010 Winner: Zoo City by Lauren Beukes
2009 Winner: The City & the City by China Miéville
As you can see, they are all books completely unique and unlike anything that came before them. A Monster Calls used incredible images to compliment a haunting story in a way that I consider completely unique. Zoo City was a book that bent multiple genres whilst still maintaining an unmatched level of vividness and realism throughout thanks to Beuke’s glorious prose. And, The City & the City, was a book that showed ‘new weird’ wasn’t reserved for certain readers, with a change of setting and intriguing characters, new weird could go mainstream.
Anyway, enough about the past. This post is about the present. For, today, The Kitschies, the prize for “novels containing elements of the speculative and fantastic” have revealed their shortlists for the most “progressive, intelligent and entertaining” books of 2012.
As founders Anne & Jared explain: “This year’s shortlisted books [was] narrowed down from 211 submissions, coming from over 40 publishers that range from literary stalwarts Granta to pulp imprint Angry Robot.”
Those nominated are as follows:
The Red Tentacle (Novel), judged by Rebecca Levene, Patrick Ness and Jared Shurin:
- Jesse Bullington, The Folly of the World (Orbit)
- Nick Harkaway, Angelmaker (William Heinemann) REVIEW
- Frances Hardinge, A Face Like Glass (Macmillan Children’s)
- Adam Roberts, Jack Glass (Gollancz)
- Julie Zeh (translated by Sally-Ann Spencer), The Method (Harvill Secker)
The Golden Tentacle (Debut):
- Madeline Ashby, vN (Angry Robot)
- Jenni Fagan, The Panopticon (William Heinemann)
- Rachel Hartman, Seraphina (Doubleday) REVIEW
- Karen Lord, Redemption in Indigo (Jo Fletcher Books)
- Tom Pollock, The City’s Son (Jo Fletcher Books)
The Inky Tentacle (Cover Art), judged by Lauren O’Farrell, Gary Northfield and Ed Warren:
- Tom Gauld, Costume Not Included by Matthew Hughes (Angry Robot)
- Oliver Jeffers, The Terrible Thing that Happened to Barnaby Brocket by John Boyne (Doubleday)
- Dave Shelton, A Boy and a Bear in a Boat by Dave Shelton (David Fickling Books)
- Peter Mendelsund, The Flame Alphabet by Ben Marcus (Granta)
- La Boca, The Teleportation Accident by Ned Beauman (Sceptre)
I think author, Rebecca Levene, defines this list perfectly by saying: “One of the problems with being a fan of genre – any genre – is that after a while it ceases to surprise you. You know its rhythms and conventions and every story feels like a remix of a story you’ve seen before. But each title on these shortlists surprised me. There are settings I’ve never seen used before, viewpoints I’ve never considered, ideas I’d never thought and worlds too weird for anyone but their particular author to have invented them. For me that’s the essence of speculative fiction.”
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The winners will be announced in a ceremony at the Free Word Centre on 26 February. Winners will receive a total of £2,000 in prize money, as well as one of the prize’s iconic Tentacle trophies and bottles of The Kraken Rum.
For more information on the award, you can visit: www.thekitschies.com we wish all those shortlisted the very best of luck.
Richard Marpole
Jennie Ivins