The Ursula K. Le Guin Prize for Fiction revealed its shortlist, with 10 authors in contention for the annual award for a book of imaginative fiction.
Vajra Chandrasekera’s The Saint of Bright Doors, which won the Nebula Award for best novel, made the shortlist, as did Samantha Harvey’s Orbital, which was previously shortlisted for the Orwell Prize for political fiction, and Nghi Vo’s Mammoths at the Gates, which was a finalist for the Nebula and Locus awards.
Sarah Cypher was named a finalist for The Skin and Its Girl, which was longlisted for the PEN/Hemingway Award, while Emily Tesh made the list for her Hugo Award–shortlisted Some Desperate Glory.
Anne de Marcken was shortlisted for It Lasts Forever and Then It's Over, alongside Alissa Hattman for Sift, Alaya Dawn Johnson for The Library of Broken Worlds, Premee Mohamed for The Siege of Burning Grass, and Micaiah Johnson for Those Beyond the Wall.
The judges for this year’s prize are authors Margaret Atwood, Omar El Akkad, Megan Giddings, Ken Liu, and Carmen Maria Machado.
The Ursula K. Le Guin Prize, named for the late, legendary science fiction and fantasy author, was first awarded in 2022 to Khadija Abdalla Bajaber for The House of Rust; last year’s winner was Rebecca Campbell for Arboreality. The winner of this year’s award, which comes with a $25,000 cash prize, will be announced on Oct. 21.
Michael Schaub is a contributing writer.
