Here’s an exercise: compare and contrast the Sunburst Award Adult category shortlist with the 2010 Prix Aurora Awards English novel nominees.

Prix Aurora Awards are the result of nominating and voting by members of the Canadian fan community. Novels submitted for the Sunburst Awards are read by a five-person jury, the members of which select the best novel in each of the Adult and Young Adult categories.

Karl Schroeder, nominated in the Adult category, likes the Sunburst physical prize. On his blog Karl explained “(Best thing about this award? It comes with a medal.)” Plus $1,000.

The full name is The Sunburst Award for Canadian Literature of the Fantastic.

Winners starting in 2001 are Sean Stewart; Margaret Sweatman; Nalo Hopkinson; Cory Doctorow; Geoff Ryman; Holly Phillips; Mark Frutkin; Nalo Hopkinson, Adult, and Joanne Proulx, Young Adult; Andrew Davidson, Adult, and Cory Doctorow, Young Adult.

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Murray

Congratulations to SFContario’s Toastmaster. Robert J. Sawyer’s Wake has won the 2010 Best Novel in English Prix Aurora Award. For all the winners see Science Fiction Awards Watch

The deadline for online voting in the 2010 Prix Aurora Awards is soon: May 22, noon, Central Daylight Time.

During Ad Astra 29 I pre-ordered from Rene Walling a copy of The Aurora Awards: Thirty Years of Canadian Science Fiction. This collection is the second collection from Montreal small press Nanopress.
Nanopress says “Including work by Isaac Szpindel, James Alan Gardner, Eileen Kernaghan, Daniel Sernine, Robert J. Sawyer, Julie Czerneda, Élisabeth Vonarburg, Candas Jane Dorsey, Yves Meynard, David Nickle, Karl Schroeder, Edo Van Belkom, Hayden Trenholm, Douglas Smith, and Laurent McAllister, with an introduction by Jean-Louis Trudel, this collection celebrates the variety and depth of stories to win the Aurora.”
This new Aurora Awards collection will be released next month during Keycon 2010, this year’s Canvention, in Winnipeg, Manitoba. Nanopress also will be at Boreal in May. If you too order The Aurora Awards before May 21 shipping is free. Rene also will have a table in the SFContario Dealer’s Room.
For more information see Nanopress

The Aurora award nominees have been announced. Congratulations to all the nominees and to concom member Sue Posteraro Jeffers in particular. Yay Sue!!

Just a quick reminder for those who have not yet nominated: you still can! The deadline for submitting nominations for the Aurora Awards is tonight on Monday, February 15. You may use the online nomination form.

If you’re not sure who to nominate, please come to our Aurora recommendations page for some ideas. Please also feel free to look at Marcel Gagne’s excellent online reference of Canadian science fiction. The Aurora committee has also posted some of their favorites on the Aurora award web site.

I’m running to be this year’s CUFF delegate. I’m very pleased to learn that this year, for the first time since 2003 it seems, there will be an election. The competition will be good for CUFF and for Canadian fandom in general. Rob Uhrig, from Nova Scotia is also in the race. I wish him the best of luck.

So why am I doing this? Well, it occurs to me that while I’ve attended conventions all over the US, I’ve never attended any in Western Canada, and this seems wrong. I’d like to rectify that situation. I’d like to meet all those fans from Western Canada that I’ve been missing, as well as visit those I have managed to meet elsewhere. I’m also eager to attend the one day conrunner’s convention that’s planned for the day following Keycon. I’d like to find out what they’re doing over there and to let them know what we’ve got going on over here.

I believe I have the organizational skills to be a good administrator. I have some ideas for fund-raising but plan to pick the brains of those who are much more experienced with that than I am for more and better ideas. I absolutely intend to publish a trip report as soon as possible upon my return. I’d also very much like to see the fund promoted more. Right now it is difficult to find very much information online. Other than the facebook page, a google search brings up little information on the application procedure, membership, qualifications, expectations, etc., and many of those hits are several years old. I’d like to address this.

Voting takes place from February 5th to February 25th. I don’t have a link for that yet but will post it as soon as I do.

Thanks to my nominators. From the West they are Fran Skene, Dave Clement, Richard Graeme Cameron and Tim Hogue. From the East they are Murray Moore, Rene Walling, Lance Sibley and Colin Hinz.