Announcing the 2020 Bram Stoker Awards Winners

The Horror Writers Association has announced the winners of this year’s Bram Stoker Awards, given last week at a virtual ceremony during StokerCon 2021. This year’s awards include two double winners: Stephen Graham Jones (for The Only Good Indians and Night of the Mannequins) and Tim Waggoner (for Writing in the Dark and “Speaking of Horror”).

The full list of nominees and winners follows, with winners in bold. Congrats to all!

Superior Achievement in a Novel

• WINNER: Stephen Graham Jones – The Only Good Indians (Saga Press)
• Alma Katsu – The Deep (G.P. Putnam’s Sons)
• Todd Keisling – Devil’s Creek (Silver Shamrock Publishing)
• Josh Malerman – Malorie (Del Rey)
• Silvia Moreno-Garcia – Mexican Gothic (Del Rey)

Superior Achievement in a First Novel

• WINNER: EV Knight – The Fourth Whore (Raw Dog Screaming Press)
• Polly Hall – The Taxidermist’s Lover (CamCat Publishing, LLC)
• Rachel Harrison – The Return (Berkley)
• Ross Jeffery – Tome (The Writing Collective)
• Kate Reed Petty – True Story (Viking)

Superior Achievement in a Graphic Novel

• WINNER: Nancy Holder (author), Chiara Di Francia (artist), and Amelia Woo (artist) – Mary Shelley Presents (Kymera Press)
• Steven Archer (author/artist) – The Masque of the Red Death (Raw Dog Screaming Press)
• Jennifer Brody (author) and Jules Rivera (artist) – Spectre Deep 6 (Turner)
• Rich Douek (author) and Alex Cormack (artist) – Road of Bones (IDW Publishing)
• Alessandro Manzetti (author) and Stefano Cardoselli (artist/author) – Her Life Matters: (Or Brooklyn Frankenstein) (Independent Legions Publishing)
• Steve Niles (author), Salvatore Simeone (author), and Szymon Kudranski (artist) – Lonesome Days, Savage Nights (TKO Studios)

Superior Achievement in a Young Adult Novel

• WINNER: Adam Cesare – Clown in a Cornfield (HarperTeen)
• Daniel Kraus – Bent Heavens (Henry Holt and Company/Macmillan)
• Monique Snyman – The Bone Carver (Vesuvian Books)
• Aiden Thomas – Cemetery Boys (Swoon Reads/Macmillan)
• Erica Waters – Ghost Wood Song (HarperTeen)

Superior Achievement in Long Fiction

• WINNER: Stephen Graham Jones – Night of the Mannequins (Tordotcom Publishing)
• Gabino Iglesias – Beyond the Reef (Lullabies for Suffering: Tales of Addiction Horror) (Wicked Run Press)
• Gwendolyn Kiste – The Invention of Ghosts (Nightscape Press)
• Jess Landry – I Will Find You, Even in the Dark (Dim Shores Presents Volume 1) (Dim Shores)
• Sarah Pinsker – Two Truths and a Lie (Tor.com)

Superior Achievement in Short Fiction

• WINNER: Josh Malerman – “One Last Transformation” (Miscreations: Gods, Monstrosities & Other Horrors) (Written Backwards)
• Meghan Arcuri – “Am I Missing the Sunlight?” (Borderlands 7) (Borderlands Press)
• Kurt Fawver – “Introduction to the Horror Story, Day 1” (Nightmare Magazine Nov. 2020 (Issue 98))
• Cindy O’Quinn – “The Thing I Found Along a Dirt Patch Road” (Shotgun Honey Presents Volume 4: Recoil) (Down and Out Books)
• Kyla Lee Ward – “Should Fire Remember the Fuel?” (Oz is Burning) (B Cubed Press)

Superior Achievement in a Fiction Collection

• WINNER: Lee Murray – Grotesque: Monster Stories (Things in the Well)
• Kathe Koja – Velocities: Stories (Meerkat Press)
• John Langan – Children of the Fang and Other Genealogies (Word Horde)
• Patricia Lillie – The Cuckoo Girls (Trepidatio Publishing)
• Anna Taborska – Bloody Britain (Shadow Publishing)

Superior Achievement in a Screenplay

• WINNER: Leigh Whannell – The Invisible Man (Universal Pictures, Blumhouse Productions, Goalpost Pictures, Nervous Tick Productions)
• Scarlett Amaris and Richard Stanley – Color Out of Space (SpectreVision)
• Misha Green – Lovecraft Country, Season 1, Episode 1: “Sundown” (Affeme, Monkeypaw Productions, Bad Robot Productions, Warner Bros. Television Studios)
• Misha Green and Ihuoma Ofordire – Lovecraft Country, Season 1, Episode 8: “Jig-a-Bobo” (Affeme, Monkeypaw Productions, Bad Robot Productions, Warner Bros. Television Studios)
• Angela LaManna – The Haunting of Bly Manor, Season 1, Episode 5: “The Altar of the Dead” (Intrepid Pictures, Amblin Television, Paramount Television Studios)

Superior Achievement in a Poetry Collection

• WINNER: Christina Sng – A Collection of Dreamscapes (Raw Dog Screaming Press)
• Alessandro Manzetti – Whitechapel Rhapsody: Dark Poems (Independent Legions Publishing)
• Jessica McHugh – A Complex Accident of Life (Apokrupha)
• Cynthia Pelayo – Into the Forest and All the Way Through (Burial Day Books)
• Sara Tantlinger – Cradleland of Parasites (Rooster Republic Press)

Superior Achievement in an Anthology

• WINNER: Lee Murray and Geneve Flynn – Black Cranes: Tales of Unquiet Women (Omnium Gatherum Media)
• Michael Bailey and Doug Murano – Miscreations: Gods, Monstrosities & Other Horrors (Written Backwards)
• Samantha Kolesnik – Worst Laid Plans: An Anthology of Vacation Horror (Grindhouse Press)
• Sara Tantlinger – Not All Monsters: A Strangehouse Anthology by Women of Horror (Rooster Republic Press)
• Mercedes M. Yardley – Arterial Bloom (Crystal Lake Publishing)

Superior Achievement in Non-Fiction

• WINNER: Tim Waggoner – Writing in the Dark (Guide Dog Books/Raw Dog Screaming Press)
• Kelly Florence and Meg Hafdahl – The Science of Women in Horror: The Special Effects, Stunts, and True Stories Behind Your Favorite Fright Films (Skyhorse)
• Alexandra Heller-Nicholas – 1000 Women in Horror (BearManor Media)
• Brian Keene – End of the Road (Cemetery Dance Publications)
• Alison Peirse – Women Make Horror: Filmmaking, Feminism, Genre (Rutgers University Press)
• Kevin J. Wetmore, Jr. – The Streaming of Hill House: Essays on the Haunting Netflix Adaption (McFarland)

Superior Achievement in Short Non-Fiction

• WINNER: Tim Waggoner – “Speaking of Horror” (The Writer)
• Rhonda Jackson Joseph – “The Beloved Haunting of Hill House: An Examination of Monstrous Motherhood” (The Streaming of Hill House: Essays on the Haunting Netflix Adaptation) (McFarland)
• Cynthia Pelayo – “I Need to Believe” (Southwest Review Volume 105.3)
• Kelly Robinson – “Lost, Found, and Finally Unbound: The Strange History of the 1910 Edison Frankenstein” (Rue Morgue Magazine, June 2020)
• Christina Sng – “Final Girl: A Life in Horror” (Interstellar Flight Magazine, October 2020)