May 15, 2020

Kitschies

Tagged: Award

Jury-selected genre Awards presented annually from 2009, not specifically for sf but for "the year's most progressive, intelligent and entertaining works that contain elements of the speculative or fantastic". The name reflects that of the Pornokitsch "geek culture" blog run by Anne C Perry and Jared Shurin, who launched the Kitschies; the "tentacle" names for categories are a nod to the initial award sponsor The Kraken Rum. These categories are Red Tentacle for best novel; Golden (added 2011) for best debut novel; Inky (added 2012) for cover art; Black (added 2011) as a catchall category for special and "judges' discretion" awards, not necessarily presented each year; and Invisible (added 2015) for "Natively Digital Fiction".

Presentations are made in the year following the year of eligibility, which is that of first publication in Great Britain (hence the 2013 debut-novel award to a 2010 title). Winners to date are listed below. No awards were presented in 2017, when a new sponsor was being sought. The current sponsor is the bookshop chain Blackwell's. [DRL]

Red Tentacle: Novel

2010: China Miéville, The City & the City (2009)
2011: Lauren Beukes, Zoo City (2010)
2012: Patrick Ness and Siobhan Dowd, A Monster Calls (2011)
2013: Nick Harkaway, Angelmaker (2012)
2014: Ruth Ozeki, A Tale for the Time Being (2013)
2015: Andrew Smith, Grasshopper Jungle (2014)
2016: Margaret Atwood, The Heart Goes Last (2015)
2017: not awarded
2018: Nina Allan, The Rift (2017)
2019: Madeline Miller, Circe (2018)
2020: Jan Carson, The Fire Starters (2019)

Golden Tentacle: Debut Novel

2011: Maurice Broaddus, King Maker (2010)
2012: Kameron Hurley, God's War (2011)
2013: Karen Lord, Redemption in Indigo (2010)
2014: Ann Leckie, Ancillary Justice (2013)
2015: Hermione Eyre, Viper Wine (2014)
2016: Tade Thompson, Making Wolf (2015)
2017: not awarded
2018: Alex "Acks" Wells, Hunger Makes the Wolf (2017)
2019: Ahmed Saadawi, Frankenstein in Baghdad (2013; trans 2018)
2020: Clare Rees, Jelly (2019)

Inky Tentacle: Cover Art

2012: Peter Mendelsund for The Last Werewolf (2011) by Glen Duncan
2013: Dave Shelton for his own A Boy and a Bear in a Boat (2012)
2014: Will Staehle for The Age Atomic (2013) by Adam Christopher
2015: Glenn O'Neill for Tigerman
2016: Jet Purdie for The Door That Led to Where (2015) by Sally Gardner
2017: not awarded
2018: Jack Smyth for The History of Bees (2017) by Maja Lunde
2019: Suzanne Dean for Killing Commendatore (2018) by Haruki Murakami
2020: Tyler Comrie for The Memory Police (2019) by Yoko Ogawa

Black Tentacle: Special/Judges' Discretion

2011: Donald Westlake, Memory (2010)
2012: Selfmadehero (Comics and Graphic Novels publisher)
2013: The World SF Blog
2014: Malorie Blackman, OBE, as UK Children's Laureate
2015: not awarded
2016: Patrick Ness's refugee-crisis Save the Children fundraiser (phrased "for the genre community, personified by Ness, for the response to the humanitarian refugee crisis")
2017: not awarded
2018: not awarded
2019: not awarded
2020: not awarded

Invisible Tentacle: Natively Digital Fiction

2015: Cardboard Computer: Kentucky Route Zero, Act III
2016: Life Is Strange
2017: not awarded
2018: not awarded
2019: not awarded
2020: not awarded

links

SFE: The Science Fiction Encyclopedia