Horror Writers Association President, Rocky Wood, has issued a press release announcing the nomination of three Australians for the 2011 Bram Stoker Awards. The ‘Stokers’ are considered the world’s premier literary awards for the Horror Genre and Thirteen O’Clock sends its heartiest congratulations to Kaaron Warren, Rocky Wood and Jack Dann for their nominations.
The press release reads:
AUSTRALIANS NOMINATED FOR INTERNATIONAL LITERARY AWARD
Three more Australians have joined the ranks of those nominated for international literary awards – this time the Bram Stoker Award, the premiere literary Awards in the Horror genre, for the year 2011. The Awards will be presented at the World Horror Convention in Salt Lake City on 31 March 2012. More information here: http://www.horror.org/blog/?p=2331.
The Awards are named for Bram Stoker, the author of Dracula, and are regarded as the premier horror genre awards each year. Previous winners include Stephen King, Joyce Carol Oates, Ray Bradbury, Anne Rice and Ira Levin.
Rocky Wood, from Melbourne, has been nominated for a Bram Stoker Award in the Non-Fiction category for his book Stephen King: A Literary Companion (McFarland, 2011).
Wood, who lives in South Yarra, has been a non-fiction writer for 30 years. His nominated work is the latest in a series of books on Stephen King’s works. “Obviously, it is very exciting to be nominated for such a prestigious international literary award, one that has been won by idols of mine such as Stephen King, Ray Bradbury and Peter Straub,” he said, “I’m also pleased that writing by an Australian has been recognised by my peers in the HWA.” The book covers all of King’s published works, putting them in context and revealing many little known details, including King’s inspiration in many.
Wood, who is also the first non-American President of the Association, will attend the Awards Dinner in Salt Lake City, Utah on 31 March.
For further information and interviews contact: Rocky Wood rockywood1959@yahoo.com.au . Please note Rocky suffers from Motor Neurone Disease. His speech is badly impacted by the disease and he prefers contact via email.
Kaaron Warren, from Canberra, has been nominated for the Bram Stoker Award in the Short Fiction category for her story, All You Can Do Is Breathe.
Warren has been publishing fiction for twenty years, with three novels and three short story collections in print. She has twice won the ACT Publisher’s and Writers Award for fiction, along with the Canberra Critics’ Circle Fiction Award, the Ditmar Award, the Aurealis Award and the Australian Shadows Award. This is her first international nomination, and she says, “I’ve long used the Bram Stoker Awards as my reading list of excellent fiction for the year, so I’m thrilled to be on the shortlist alongside two of my favourite writers, Stephen King and George Saunders”. The short listed story explores our obsession with survivors.’ Kaaron is on Twitter @kaaronwarren and her webpage is kaaronwarren.wordpress.com
Jack Dann has been nominated along with his fellow editor Nick Gevers, for the Bram Stoker Award in the Anthology category for Ghosts By Gaslight (Harper Voyager, 2011). Dann is a multiple-award winning author who has written or edited over seventy-five books, including the international bestseller The Memory Cathedral, which was #1 on The Age Bestseller List, and The Silent, which Library Journal chose as one of their ‘Hot Picks’ and wrote: “This is narrative storytelling at its best… Most emphatically recommended.” He is also the editor of the anthology Dreaming Down-Under (with Janeen Webb), which won the World Fantasy Award in 1999, and Dreaming Again, which Bookseller+Publisher gave a five star review and chose as their ‘Pick of the Week’. Dann lives in South Gippsland and Melbourne, and his website is jackdann.com.
