2023 Stoker Awards Preliminary Ballot

Superior Achievement in Short Fiction

• “Your Dasher Has Accidentally Awakened the Crawling Chaos by Gazing into the Loathsome Geometry of the Taco Pup Mega-muncher Meal Box”, David Anaxagoras (The Dread Machine 3.1)
• “Silk” L.E. Daniels, (Hush, Don’t Wake the Monster: Stories Inspired by Stephen King)
• “Sound of Children Screaming”, Rachael K. Jones (Nightmare 10/23)
• “Chainsaw: As Is”, Gillian King-Cargile (PseudoPod 5/26/23)
•  “Meat”, Kristin Kirby (Negative Space 2: A Return to Survival Horror)
• “Giallo”, Robert Levy (No One Dies from Love: Dark Tales of Loss & Longing)
• “If Someone You Love Has Become a Vurdalak”, Sam J. Miller (The Dark 7/23)
• “Quondam”, Cindy O’Quinn (The Nightmare Never Ends)
• “I’ll See You in Forever”, Cindy O’Quinn & Nathan McCullough (Sudden Fictions #6)
• “An Inherited Taste”, Nadine Aurora Tabing (No Trouble at All)

Superior Achievement in a Fiction Collection

• You Are My Sunshine and Other Tales, Octavia Cade (Stelliform)
• Midnight Masquerade, Greg Chapman (IFWG)
• Have You Seen the Moon Tonight? & Other Rumors, Jonathan Louis Duckworth (JournalStone)
• Blood from the Air, Gemma Files (Grimscribe)
• Cold, Black, & Infinite, Todd Keisling (Cemetery Dance)
• Spin a Black Yarn, Josh Malerman (Del Rey)
• The Best of Our Past, the Worst of Our Future, Christi Nogle (Flame Tree)
• Root Rot & Other Grim Tales, Sarah Read (Bad Hand)
• The Inconsolables, Michael Wehunt (Bad Hand)
• Gordon B. White Is Creating Haunting Weird Horror(s), Gordon B. White (Trepidatio)

Superior Achievement in an Anthology

• Shakespeare Unleashed, James Aquilone, ed. (Crystal Lake)
• Qualia Nous, Vol. 2, Michael Bailey, ed. (Written Backwards)
• Soul Jar: 31 Fantastical Tales by Disabled Authors, Annie Carl, ed.(Forest Avenue)
• Christmas and Other Horrors, Ellen Datlow, ed. (Titan)
• Collage Macabre: An Exhibition of Art Horror, Future Dead Collective, ed. (Future Dead Collective)
• The Drive-In: Multiplex, Christopher Golden & Brian Keene, eds. (Pandi)
• Never Whistle at Night: An Indigenous Dark Fiction Anthology, Shane Hawk & Theodore C. Van Alst, Jr., eds. (Vintage)
• Out There Screaming, Jordan Peele & John Joseph Adams, eds. (Random House)
• American Cannibal, Rebecca Rowland, ed. (Maenad)
• Darkness Blooms, Alin Walker & Monica Louzon, eds. (The Dread Machine)

Superior Achievement in Long Non-Fiction

• All Kinds of Scary: Diversity in Contemporary Horror, Jonina Anderson-Lopez (McFarland)
• The Black Guy Dies First: Black Horror Cinema from Fodder to Oscar, Robin R. Means Coleman & Mark H. Harris (Saga)
• A Vindication of Monsters: Essays on Mary Wollstonecraft and Mary Shelley, Claire Fitzpatrick, ed. (IFWG)
• God’s Monsters: Vengeful Spirits, Deadly Angels, Hybrid Creatures, and Divine Hitmen of the Bible, Esther J. Hamori (Broadleaf)
• 101 Horror Books to Read Before You’re Murdered, Sadie Hartmann (Page Street)
• The Art of the Zombie Movie, Lisa Morton (Applause)
• Unquiet Spirits: Essays by Asian Women in Horror, Lee Murray & Angela Yuriko Smith, eds. (Black Spot)
• Queer for Fear: Horror Film and the Queer Spectator, Heather O. Petrocelli (University of Wales Press)
• The Color of Melancholy: An Examination of Andrew Pyper’s Novels as Intersected through My Life, Steve Stred (Black Void)
• Gothic Things: Dark Enchantment and Anthropocene Anxiety, Jeffrey Andrew Weinstock (Fordham University Press)

Superior Achievement in Short Non-Fiction

• “Words Wielded by Women”, Carina Bissett (Apex 5/23)
• “Becoming Ungovernable: Latah, Amok, and Disorder in Indonesia”, Nadia Bulkin (Unquiet Spirits: Essays by Asian Women in Horror)
• “Entering the Ecosystem: Human Identity, Biology, and Horror”, Octavia Cade (Horror and Philosophy: Essays on Their Intersection in Film, Television and Literature)
• “Heterotopic Hell Ride on The Midnight Meat Train”, Ana Došen (Journeys into Terror: Essays from the Cinematic Intersection of Travel and Horror)
• “The Gothic Shapeshifter: Man, Monster, Myth”, John Kachuba (The Gothique: Myriad Manifestations)
• “Cats and the Occult: A Canthropology”, Katherine Kerestman (The Weird Cat)
• “100 Livers”, K.P. Kulski (Unquiet Spirits: Essays by Asian Women in Horror)
• “Displaced Spirits”, Lee Murray (Unquiet Spirits: Essays by Asian Women in Horror)
• “Miasma Theory, Particulate Matter and Modern Horror”, Jeffrey Andrew Weinstock (Female Identity in Contemporary Purgatorial Worlds)
• “A Theatre of Ghosts, a Haunted Cinema: The Japanese Gothic as Theatrical Tradition in Gurozuka”, Kevin Wetmore, Jr.(Wenshan Review of Literature and Culture: Special Issue on Asian Gothic 6/23)

Superior Achievement in Poetry

• The Taste of Butter, Amanda Crum (self-published)
• Bleeding Rainbows and Other Broken Spectrums, Maxwell Ian Gold (Hex)
• The Patient Routine, Luna Rey Hall (Brigids Gate)
• Lupine, Jenny Irish (Black Lawrence)
• Ophelia, V.C. McCabe (Femme Salvé)
• The Quiet Ways I Destroy You, Jessica McHugh (Apokrupha)
• The Chimera, Michael Perret (Curious Corvid)
• Rivers in Your Skin, Sirens in Your Hair, Marisca Pichette (Android)
• Numinous Stones, Holly Lyn Walrath (Aqueduct)
• On the Subject of Blackberries, Stephanie M. Wytovich (Raw Dog Screaming)

Superior Achievement in a Graphic Novel

• Ghostlore, Vol. 1, Cullen Bunn, art by Leomacs (BOOM! Studios)
• Dead Mall, Adam Cesare, art by David Stoll (Dark Horse)
• Carmilla: The First Vampire, Amy Chu, art by Soo Lee (Dark Horse)
• The Sixth Sentinel: Graphic Novel, Alessandro Manzetti & Stefano Fantelli, art by Stefano Cardoselli (Independent Legions)
• Past Tense, Jason McNamara, art by Alberto Massaggia (Dark Horse)
• Tombs, Junji Ito (Viz Media)
• The Ward: Welcome to the Madhouse, Cavan Scott, art by Andres Ponce (Dark Horse)
• Where Monsters Lie, Kyle Stark, art by Piotr Kowalski (Dark Horse Comics)
• Evil Cast, Kyle Stuck, art by Enrico Orlandi (Ominous Media)
• H.P. Lovecraft’s The Shadow Over Innsmouth, Gou Tanabe (Dark Horse)

Superior Achievement in a Screenplay

• Birth/Rebirth
• Black Mirror: “Beyond the Sea”
• Creepshow: “The Hat”
• The Exorcist: Believer
• Godzilla Minus One
• Hell House LLC Origins: The Carmichael Manor
• Huesera: The Bone Woman
• No One Will Save You
• When Evil Lurks
• Where the Devil Roams

Voting is now open to HWA members until February 15, 2024. The final ballot will be announced on February 23, 2024. Winners will be honored at a gala during StokerCon 2024, to be held May 30 – June 2, 2024 at the San Diego Marriott Mission Valley in San Diego CA. For more information, see the Stoker Awards website.

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