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BSFA Awards

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BSFA Awards 2005 - Nominations

Artwork

 

Short fiction:

Novel:

Non-Fiction:

The BSFA award for non-fiction, which was suspended for 2004, was restored for 2005 with a new approach aimed at addressing the difficulties of comparing the rather different forms such writing can take, while retaining a crucial role for BSFA members.

The British Science Fiction Association award for non-fiction is open to any writing about science fiction or fantasy published, on paper or online, in the previous calendar year. The award is not confined to academic criticism or reviews, but neither does it exclude these categories. Works published by the BSFA itself are not eligible for the BSFA awards.

For 2005, the shortlist and the overall winner were selected by a panel of three judges from nominations made by members of the BSFA. The judges for the 2005 award, drawn in this pilot year from within the BSFA organisation, were Niall Harrison, Steve Jeffery and Geneva Melzack.

The intention behind the award is to promote good and thought-provoking writing about science fiction, with an eye to recommending this writing to anyone interested in science fiction and to members of the BSFA in particular. Therefore, the full shortlist announced alongside the winner has been published as a list of 'recommended reading'.

The judges for the 2005 award provided the following statement:

'We found 2005 to have been a good year for non-fiction. In addition to the diverse range of works nominated by other BSFA members, we considered book-length works as well as individual articles and collaborative works appearing in journals, magazines, websites and web logs.

'We feel that the final shortlist both reflects this diversity and recognises the qualities we think this award should celebrate. It therefore includes works that we consider to be insightful, innovative, and well-written.'

The shortlist was:

The judges' statement continues:

'One of the obvious challenges in judging an award like this is balancing book-length works and shorter articles and essays, including those from non-traditional media. All of these have their own strengths but, in their own ways, each of the shortlisted works demonstrates the qualities for which we were looking in writing about science fiction or fantasy. If they have a single quality in common, it is that they make you think.

'However, our final choice came down to a closely-argued decision between two book-length works. One of these -- The History of Science Fiction by Adam Roberts -- examines the historic ideas and the mindset that led to the development of science fiction as a particular branch of fantastic literature. It presents a wide-ranging and original thesis which, whether the reader agrees or disagrees with it, forces them to think about the ways in which science fiction developed.

'It was a very close decision but, in the end, the judges decided that the 2005 BSFA award for non-fiction should go to Soundings by Gary K Wolfe. This collection of reviews provides a reader's-eye view of science fiction in the early 1990s. Wolfe's reviews are consistently both perceptive and entertaining, and filled with innumerable careful observations that are as useful to think with as they are to think about. Collected together, they stand as an admirable exemplar of reviewing as a forum for critical discourse, and are essential reading for anyone interested in written science fiction.'