The John W. Campbell Award for the best science fiction novel of the year has been presented since 1973 and represents a unique award within the genre; unlike the Nebula (voted on by the members of SFWA) and the Hugo (voted on by the members of fandom), the John W. Campbell Award is selected by a jury and administered by the Gunn Center for the study of science fiction at the University of Kansas, and is presented during the center’s annual Campbell Conference.
Members of the jury this year are: Gregory Benford, Paul Di Filippo, Sheila Finch, James Gunn, Elizabeth Anne Hull, Paul Kincaid, Christopher McKitterick, Pamela Sargent, and T.A. Shippey. Prior jury members have included Paul A. Carter and Farah Mendlesohn. (A group that is well qualified to select a best novel.)
The award was established by Harry Harrison and Brian Aldiss as a way to honor the editor of Astounding/Analog, John W. Campbell, Jr.
This year’s nominees are:
Lexicon by Max Barry (Penguin)
Proxima by Stephen Baxter (Gollancz)
The Circle by Dave Eggers (Knopf)
We Are All Completely Beside Ourselves by Karen Joy Fowler (Marian Wood / Putnam)
Hild by Nicola Griffith (Farrar, Straus, and Giroux)
The Cusanus Game by Wolfgang Jeschke (Tor, 1st English edition)
Ancillary Justice by Ann Leckie (Orbit)
The Disestablishment of Paradise by Phillip Mann (Gollancz)
Evening’s Empires by Paul McAuley (Gollancz)
The Red: First Light by Linda Nagata (Mythic Island Press)
The Adjacent by Christopher Priest (Gollancz)
On the Steel Breeze by Alastair Reynolds (Gollancz)
Shaman by Kim Stanley Robinson (Orbit)
Neptune’s Brood by Charles Stross (Ace)
Strange Bodies by Marcel Theroux (Faber & Faber / Farrar, Straus, and Giroux)
(If Ann Leckie wins this award, the Hugo and the Locus she will have pulled off an unprecedented compilation of awards for a single novel.)
The Campbell Conference takes place this June 13-16 at the University of Kansas, Lawrence and is focused on an appreciation of Frederik Pohl.
“This year – in addition to the John W. Campbell Memorial Award and the Theodore Sturgeon Memorial Award – we will also honor Frederik Pohl for his long and distinguished service to the Center, the Sturgeon Award jury, and the field of science fiction in general.”
Thanks Steve.
Roger – there are two JWC named awards – the best new writer and the Gunn center for the study of science fiction best novel award.
Strange, I always thought the Campbell award was for best new author; how’d I get that mixed up?