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  "description": "Some of the best from 2025",
  "path": "/2026-nebula-award-finalists-sfwa-science-fiction-fantasy-awards/",
  "publishedAt": "2026-03-16T14:59:24.000Z",
  "site": "https://www.andrewliptak.com",
  "tags": [
    "2025",
    "2024",
    "2023",
    "2022",
    "Nebula Conference",
    "Descent",
    "Our Echoes Drifting Through the Marsh",
    "Uncertain Sons",
    "We Begin Where Infinity Ends",
    "The Name Ziya",
    "Never Eaten Vegetables",
    "The Life and Times of Alavira the Great as Written by Titos Pavlou and Reviewed by Two Lifelong Friends",
    "Through the Machine",
    "Six People to Revise You",
    "In My Country",
    "The Tawlish Island Songbook of the Dead",
    "Because I Held His Name Like a Key",
    "Laser Eyes Ain't Everything",
    "They Said Robots Are",
    "The World To Come",
    "The Mourning Robot",
    "Care for Lightning",
    "To Be the Change",
    "that I really liked"
  ],
  "textContent": "The Science Fiction and Fantasy Writers Association has announced the finalists for this year's Nebula Awards, the annual prize for excellence in the science fiction and fantasy genres published in the last year.\n\nThe Nebula is one of the biggest awards in the science fiction and fantasy world. It's been handed out annually since 1966, honoring the works in the bigger categories like novels and short stories, and it's been expanded in recent years. This year marks two new categories: Best Poem and Best Comic.\n\nHere are the winners from 2025, 2024, 2023, and 2022.\n\n## Sign up for Transfer Orbit\n\nA newsletter about science fiction, reading, and the future\n\nSubscribe\n\nEmail sent! Check your inbox to complete your signup.\n\nNo spam. Unsubscribe anytime.\n\nIf you're a SFWA member, voting is now underway and will run through 11:59pm PDT on April 15th. The winners will be announced at this year's Nebula Conference in Chicago on Saturday, June 6th.\n\nHere are the finalists (I've added links for the stories that are available online):\n\n### Best Novel\n\n  * _When We Were Real_ by Daryl Gregory\n  *  _The Buffalo Hunter Hunter_ by Stephen Graham Jones\n  * _Katabasis_ by R.F. Kuang\n  *  _Death of the Author_ by Nnedi Okorafor\n  *  _The Incandescent_ by Emily Tesh\n  *  _Sour Cherry_ by Natalia Theodoridou\n  * _Wearing the Lion_ by John Wiswell\n\n\n\n### Best Novella\n\n  *  _Disgraced Return of the Kap's Needle_ by Renan Bernardo\n  * _The River Has Roots_ by Amal El-Mohtar\n  * _The Death of Mountains_ by Jordan Kurella\n  * _Automatic Noodle_ by Annalee Newitz\n  * _But Not Too Bold_ by Hache Pueyo\n  * “Descent” by Wole Talabi (_Clarkesworld Magazine_ 5/25)\n\n\n\n### Best Novelette\n\n  * “Our Echoes Drifting Through the Marsh” by Marie Croke (_Beneath Ceaseless Skies_ 1/9/25)\n  * “Uncertain Sons” by Thomas Ha (_Uncertain Sons_)\n  * “We Begin Where Infinity Ends” by Somto Ihezue (_Clarkesworld Magazine_ 2/25)\n  * The Name Ziya __ by Wen-Yi Lee (Tor)\n  * “Never Eaten Vegetables” by H.H. Pak (_Clarkesworld Magazine_ 1/25)\n  * “The Life and Times of Alavira the Great as Written by Titos Pavlou and Reviewed by Two Lifelong Friends” by Eugenia Triantafyllou (_Uncanny Magazine_ 3-4/25)\n\n\n\n### Best Short Story\n\n  * “Through the Machine” by P.A. Cornell (_Lightspeed Magazine,_ 5/25)\n  * “Six People to Revise You” by J.R. Dawson (_Uncanny Magazine,_ 1-2/25)\n  * “In My Country” by Thomas Ha (_Clarkesworld Magazine_ 4/25)\n  * “The Tawlish Island Songbook of the Dead” by E.M. Linden (_PodCastle_ 2/18/25)\n  * “Because I Held His Name Like a Key” by Aimee Ogden (_Strange Horizons_ 6/16/25)\n  * “Laser Eyes Ain't Everything” by Effie Seiberg (_Diabolical Plots_ 5/25)\n\n\n\n### Andre Norton Award for Best Middle Grade and Young Adult Fiction\n\n  *  _The Tower_ by David Anaxagoras\n  *  _Gemini Rising_ by Jonathan Brazee\n  * _Wishing Well, Wishing Well_ by Jubilee Cho\n  * _Sunrise on the Reaping_ by Suzanne Collins\n  * _Into the Wild Magic_ by Michelle Knudsen\n  * _Goblin Girl_ by K.A. Mielke\n\n\n\n### Best Game Writing\n\n  *  _Spire, Surge, and Sea_ , Stewart C. Baker (Choice of Games)\n  * _Clair Obscur: Expedition 33,_ Guillaume Broche & Jennifer Svedberg-Yen (Kepler Interactive), Developer: Sandfall Interactive, Sandfall S.A.S.\n  * _Hollow Knight: Silksong_ , Ari Gibson & William Pelen (Team Cherry)*\n  * _Dispatch_ , Ashley Jeffalone, Suzee Matson, Chris Rebbert, Chad Rhiness, & Pierre Shorette (AdHoc Studios)\n  * _Hades II_ , Greg Kasavin (Supergiant Games)\n  * _Blue Prince_ , Tonda Ros (Raw Fury, Developer: Dogubomb)\n\n\n\n*Provisional nomination; awaiting acceptance and response on LLM-use.\n\n### Ray Bradbury Award for Outstanding Dramatic Presentation\n\n  * _KPop Demon Hunters_ , Danya Jimenez, Maggie Kang, & Hannah McMechan (Netflix)*\n  * _Sinners_ , Ryan Coogler (Warner Bros Pictures)*\n  * _Severance,_ \"Chikhai Bardo\", by Dan Erickson & Mark Friedman (Apple TV+)*\n  * _Pluribus_ : Season One, Vince Gilligan (Apple TV+)*\n  * _Superman_ , James Gunn (Warner Bros Pictures)*\n  * _Murderbot_ : Season One, Chris Weitz (Apple TV+)*\n\n\n\n*Provisional nomination; awaiting acceptance and response on LLM-use.\n\n### Best Comic\n\n  *  _Second Shift_ by Kit Anderson\n  * _Carmilla Volume 3: The Eternal_ by Amy Chu\n  * _Helen of Wyndhorn_ by Tom King\n  * _Fishflies_ by Jeff Lemire\n  *  _Mary Shelley's School for Monsters: The Killing Stone_ by Jessica Maison\n  * _Strange Bedfellows_ by Ariel Slamet Ries\n  *  _The Flip Side_ by Jason Walz\n  *  _The Stoneshore Register_ by G. Willow Wilson\n\n\n\n### Best Poem\n\n  * “Though You Always Are” by Linda D. Addison & Jamal Hodge (_Everything Endless_)\n  * “They Said Robots Are” by Casey Aimer (_Penumbric_ 6/25)\n  * “The World To Come” by Jennifer Hudak (_Strange Horizons_ 12/22/25)\n  * “The Mourning Robot” by Angela Liu (_Uncanny Magazine_ 9-10/25)\n  * “Care for Lightning” by Mari Ness (_Uncanny Magazine_ 1-2/25)\n  * “To Be the Change” by Nico Martinez Nocito (_Strange Horizons_ 3/10/25)\n\n\n\n* * *\n\n2025 felt like a really strong year for books, and I was happy to see a bunch of books that I really liked – _Automatic Noodle, The Buffalo Hunter Hunter, Death of the Author,_ and _Katabasis –_ made the final cut _._ After last night's best picture loss, I'm happy to see that _Sinners_ is on there, but I also really enjoyed _KPop Demon Hunters, Murderbot, Pluribus,_ and _Superman._\n\nWhat are your thoughts on the ballot this year? Let me know in the comments.",
  "title": "Here are the finalists for the 2026 Nebula Awards",
  "updatedAt": "2026-03-19T00:41:51.104Z"
}