2020 Bram Stoker Award Final Ballot Announced

The Horror Writers Association (HWA) has announced the finalists for 2020’s Bram Stoker Award, for superior achievement in horror writing. Past winners include horror legends Stephen King, Thomas Harris (The Silence of the Lambs), and Neil Gaiman (American Gods). This year’s finalists include some absolutely stellar writers with some incredible work.

Finalists for Superior Achievement in a Novel include Stephen Graham Jones’ The Only Good Indians, a story about nature’s revenge on a group of Native American hunters for a mistake they made as younger men. This book also includes a pivotal scene involving basketball. Personally, it was my favourite horror novel that I read last year. Jones’ work Night of the Mannequins has also been nominated for Superior Achievement in Long Fiction.

Mexican-Canadian author Silvia Moreno-Garcia has been nominated for Superior Achievement in a Novel for her novel Mexican Gothic, which our own Andy Hageman described in glowing terms:

Something to love about Mexican Gothic is the myriad interconnected layers of haunting. From the ghosts of families, nations, and globalization to architecture, extractivist mining, and dream logics, Moreno-Garcia designs this story like a lenticular portrait.

Graphic novels that are finalists for the 2020 Bram Stoker Award range from Lonesome Days, Savage Nights from Steve Niles, Salvatore Simeone, and Szymon Kudranski, which is about a cop with a case of lycanthropy. I admit, I have this one but haven’t dug into it too much yet, but I like the noir style. Road of Bones by Alex Cormack and Rich Douek takes place in a Siberian gulag with escapees dealing with the frozen elements and a creature out of childhood fairy-tales.

Young Adult novels nominated this year range from Adam Cesare’s Clown in a Cornfield about a killer clown terrorizing a small town, and Cemetery Boys by Aiden Thomas featuring a trans teenager who summons a ghost he can’t seem to get rid of.

Screenplays featured in this year’s finalists are Color Out of Space, the beautiful and horrifying Lovecraft adaptation starring Nicholas Cage, with several episodes of Lovecraft County also nominated. The Haunting of Bly Manor and Invisible Man round out the list of finalists for Superior Achievement in a Screenplay.

Other categories include Poetry and Fiction Collections, Anthology, Non-Fiction, and Short Nonfiction. Voting for the 2020 Bram Stoker Award Final Ballot is open to HWA Lifetime and Active Members and closes March 15th. Browse the list of all the finalists with links to the authors’ or publishers’ sites below.

Congratulations to all the finalists! 2020 was an incredible year for horror.

Superior Achievement in a Novel

• Jones, Stephen Graham—The Only Good Indians (Gallery/Saga Press)
• Katsu, Alma—The Deep (G.P. Putnam’s Sons)
• Keisling, Todd—Devil’s Creek (Silver Shamrock Publishing)
• Malerman, Josh—Malorie (Del Rey)
• Moreno-Garcia, Silvia—Mexican Gothic (Del Rey)

Superior Achievement in a First Novel

• Hall, Polly—The Taxidermist’s Lover (CamCat Publishing, LLC)
• Harrison, Rachel—The Return (Berkley)
• Jeffery, Ross—Tome (The Writing Collective)
• Reed Petty, Kate—True Story (Viking)

Superior Achievement in a Graphic Novel

• Archer, Steven (author/artist)—The Masque of the Red Death (Raw Dog Screaming Press)
• Brody, Jennifer (author) and Rivera, Jules (artist)—Spectre Deep 6 (Turner)
• Douek, Rich (author) and Cormack, Alex (artist)—Road of Bones (IDW Publishing)
• Holder, Nancy (author), Di Francia, Chiara (artist), and Woo, Amelia (artist)—Mary Shelley Presents (Kymera Press)
• Manzetti, Alessandro (author) and Cardoselli, Stefano (artist/author)—Her Life Matters: (Or Brooklyn Frankenstein) (Independent Legions Publishing)
• Niles, Steve (author), Simeone, Salvatore (author), and Kudranski, Szymon (artist)—Lonesome Days, Savage Nights (TKO Studios)

Superior Achievement in a Young Adult Novel

• Cesare, Adam—Clown in a Cornfield (HarperTeen)
• Kraus, Daniel—Bent Heavens (Henry Holt and Company/Macmillan)
• Snyman, Monique—The Bone Carver (Vesuvian Books)
• Thomas, Aiden—Cemetery Boys (Swoon Reads/Macmillan)
• Waters, Erica—Ghost Wood Song (HarperTeen)

Superior Achievement in Long Fiction

• Iglesias, Gabino—Beyond the Reef (Lullabies for Suffering: Tales of Addiction Horror) (Wicked Run Press)
• Jones, Stephen Graham—Night of the Mannequins (Tor.com)
• Kiste, Gwendolyn—The Invention of Ghosts (Nightscape Press)
• Landry, Jess—I Will Find You, Even in the Dark (Dim Shores Presents Volume 1) (Dim Shores)
• Pinsker, Sarah—Two Truths and a Lie (Tor.com)

Superior Achievement in Short Fiction

• Arcuri, Meghan—“Am I Missing the Sunlight?” (Borderlands 7) (Borderlands Press)
• Fawver, Kurt—“Introduction to the Horror Story, Day 1” (Nightmare Magazine Nov. 2020 (Issue 98))
• Malerman, Josh—“One Last Transformation” (Miscreations: Gods, Monstrosities & Other Horrors) (Written Backwards)
• O’Quinn, Cindy—“The Thing I Found Along a Dirt Patch Road” (Shotgun Honey Presents Volume 4: Recoil) (Down and Out Books)
• Ward, Kyla Lee—“Should Fire Remember the Fuel?” (Oz is Burning) (B Cubed Press)

Superior Achievement in a Fiction Collection

• Koja, Kathe—Velocities: Stories (Meerkat Press)
• Langan, John—Children of the Fang and Other Genealogies (Word Horde)
• Lillie, Patricia—The Cuckoo Girls (Trepidatio Publishing)
• Murray, Lee—Grotesque: Monster Stories (Things in the Well)
• Taborska, Anna—Bloody Britain (Shadow Publishing)

Superior Achievement in a Screenplay

• Amaris, Scarlett and Stanley, Richard—Color Out of Space (SpectreVision)
• Green, Misha—Lovecraft Country, Season 1, Episode 1: “Sundown” (Affeme, Monkeypaw Productions, Bad Robot Productions, Warner Bros. Television Studios)
• Green, Misha and Ofordire, Ihuoma—Lovecraft Country, Season 1, Episode 8: “Jig-a-Bobo” (Affeme, Monkeypaw Productions, Bad Robot Productions, Warner Bros. Television Studios)
• LaManna, Angela—The Haunting of Bly Manor, Season 1, Episode 5: “The Altar of the Dead” (Intrepid Pictures, Amblin Television, Paramount Television Studios)
• Whannell, Leigh—The Invisible Man (Universal Pictures, Blumhouse Productions, Goalpost Pictures, Nervous Tick Productions)

Superior Achievement in a Poetry Collection

• Manzetti, Alessandro—Whitechapel Rhapsody: Dark Poems (Independent Legions Publishing)
• McHugh, Jessica—A Complex Accident of Life (Apokrupha)
• Pelayo, Cynthia—Into the Forest and All the Way Through (Burial Day Books)
• Sng, Christina—A Collection of Dreamscapes (Raw Dog Screaming Press)
• Tantlinger, Sara—Cradleland of Parasites (Rooster Republic Press)

Superior Achievement in an Anthology

• Bailey, Michael and Murano, Doug—Miscreations: Gods, Monstrosities & Other Horrors (Written Backwards)
• Murray, Lee and Flynn, Geneve—Black Cranes: Tales of Unquiet Women (Omnium Gatherum Media)
• Kolesnik, Samantha—Worst Laid Plans: An Anthology of Vacation Horror (Grindhouse Press)
• Tantlinger, Sara—Not All Monsters: A Strangehouse Anthology by Women of Horror (Rooster Republic Press)
• Yardley, Mercedes M.—Arterial Bloom (Crystal Lake Publishing)

Superior Achievement in Non-Fiction

• Florence, Kelly and Hafdahl, Meg—The Science of Women in Horror: The Special Effects, Stunts, and True Stories Behind Your Favorite Fright Films (Skyhorse)
• Heller-Nicholas, Alexandra—1000 Women in Horror (BearManor Media)
• Keene, Brian—End of the Road (Cemetery Dance Publications)
• Peirse, Alison—Women Make Horror: Filmmaking, Feminism, Genre (Rutgers University Press)
• Waggoner, Tim—Writing in the Dark (Guide Dog Books/Raw Dog Screaming Press)
• Wetmore, Jr. Kevin J.—The Streaming of Hill House: Essays on the Haunting Netflix Adaption (McFarland)

Superior Achievement in Short Non-Fiction

• Jackson Joseph, Rhonda—“The Beloved Haunting of Hill House: An Examination of Monstrous Motherhood” (The Streaming of Hill House: Essays on the Haunting Netflix Adaptation) (McFarland)
• Pelayo, Cynthia—“I Need to Believe” (Southwest Review Volume 105.3)
• Robinson, Kelly—“Lost, Found, and Finally Unbound: The Strange History of the 1910 Edison Frankenstein” (Rue Morgue Magazine, June 2020)
• Sng, Christina—“Final Girl: A Life in Horror” (Interstellar Flight Magazine, October 2020)
• Waggoner, Tim—“Speaking of Horror” (The Writer)

Looking for more about the 2020 Bram Stoker Awards? We’ve got you:

“2020 Bram Stoker Award Winners Announced”