from http://www.sfcenter.ku.edu/news.htm

Campbell, Sturgeon, and Lifeboat Winners Announced;

Frederik Pohl Honored for Sturgeon Award Service

LAWRENCE, KS – June 17, 2013
for immediate release

The winners of this year’s John W. Campbell Memorial Award for the best science fiction novel, Theodore Sturgeon Memorial Award for the best short science fiction, and Lifeboat to the Stars Award have been revealed, announced Christopher McKitterick, Director of the Gunn Center for the Study of Science Fiction. The awards were presented during the Campbell Conference Awards banquet on Friday, June 14, as part of the Campbell Conference held annually at the University of Kansas in Lawrence.

The first-ever Lifeboat to the Stars Award went to Tau Ceti, a unique combination of novella by Kevin J. Anderson and sequel novelette by Steven Savile; Anderson was on hand to accept the award. The Lifeboat Foundation established this new award to recognize the best work of science fiction published in 2011 or 2012 that contributes to an understanding of the benefits, means, or difficulties of interstellar travel, in the hope that it will assist with the Foundation’s goal to improve humankind’s long-term survival. Eric Klien, President and administrator of the Foundation, said, “science fiction has the ability to explore the unknown and its human implications. We want to encourage writers to contribute their imaginations to these vital purposes.”

Molly Gloss won the Sturgeon Award for her short story “The Grinnell Method,” from the September, 2012, issue of Strange Horizons. Though she was unable to attend, Gloss provided a video of her acceptance speech. Linda Nagata won second place for “Nahiku West,” published in the October issue of Analog. Robert Reed took third place with Eater-of-Bone, a stand-alone novella by PS Publishing. The jurors note that the voting for this year’s prize was especially close, and that all of the top three stories deserve recognition. The Sturgeon Award was established in 1987 by James Gunn, Founding Director of the Center for the Study of Science Fiction at KU, and the heirs of Theodore Sturgeon, including his partner Jayne Engelhart Tannehill and Sturgeon’s children, as an appropriate memorial to one of the great short-story writers in a field distinguished by its short fiction.

Adam Roberts won the Campbell Award for Jack Glass: The Story of a Murderer; due to other obligations, Roberts was unable to attend, but sent his video acceptance. Terry Bisson’s Any Day Now, published by Overlook, won second place. Third place was a tie between M. John Harrison’s Empty Space, published by Gollancz and Night Shade Books; and G. Willow Wilson’s debut novel, Alif the Unseen, published by Grove Press. As with this year’s Sturgeon Award, the Campbell Award voting was extremely close, which is why the jury wished to recognize four books this year instead of the usual three. Writers and critics Harry Harrison and Brian W. Aldiss established the Campbell Award to honor the late editor of Astounding Science Fiction magazine (which later became Analog) as a way of continuing his efforts to encourage writers to produce their best possible work. Campbell, who edited the magazine from 1937 until his death in 1971, is called by many writers and scholars the father of modern science fiction.

Depending on your reading tastes, your favorite book or short story for 2012 might turn out to be any of the finalists, so the jurors recommend that you read all the works on both the Sturgeon short-list and the Campbell short-list.

Additionally, James Gunn presented a special Sturgeon Award to Frederik Pohl for his long and distinguished service to the Award and the Center. Starting in 1995, when the Sturgeon Award became a juried award, Pohl served first with James Gunn and Judith Merril, and since then with several other highly respected jurors. Pohl also presented many talks, recorded a fantastic discussion about “Ideas in Science Fiction” for the Literature of Science Fiction Lecture Series, served the Intensive Institute on Science Fiction and Science Fiction Writing Workshop, and lent his understanding to the Center in countless other ways. We very much appreciate his insight and friendship, and will miss him.

Using the theme “To the Stars” (“Ad Astra Per Aspera” is the Kansas state motto), this year’s Saturday morning round-table discussion explored SF’s long relationship with off-planet travel, its promises, and the future of the human race as a galactic species. We also discussed the important steps along the path to the stars, and of course science fiction and its role in these themes. On Saturday afternoon, Kevin J. Anderson, Andy Duncan, and James Gunn read from new works, and the second issue of James Gunn’s Ad Astra journal was released. Attending special guests included authors Andy Duncan, James Gunn, and Kij Johnson; editor Eric T. Reynolds; and film-maker Kevin Willmott, who hosted a special screening of his upcoming film, Destination: Planet Negro!; plus many others.

Congratulations to all the honorees! Many thanks to all who attended, and thanks to the winners for providing us all with such fine reading – Ad Astra!

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