More on the Sir Julius Vogel Awards

The Sir Julus Vogel Award

I think the full ConText and Sir Julius Vogel Award ceremony reports may have to be several posts because I have so many convention highlights to report. But I will start with a little more on the Sir Julius Vogel Award ceremony because The Heir of Night jointly winning the award for Best Novel was definitely a defining moment of my weekend.

The evening began with the convention banquet, followed by the award ceremony, and I was very pleased to have my partner there with me, as well as my publicist, Karen (from Little Brown), my friend Emily who had driven three hours just to get there, and a number of other writing, artist and SFFANZ friends. So even before the awards ceremony, the evening was a convivial and friendly end to the main part of the convention.

The Award ceremony was hosted by Norman Cates and Lynelle Howell of the Sir Julius Vogel Awards committee, with the professional awards primarily being presented by international guests of honor, Catherine Asaro, and Donald Walcott. I was also honored to be asked to present the award for "Best New Talent."

The Award for "Best Novel" was first off the award presentation blocks, so I was not kept in suspense long—and was absolutely thrilled when The Heir of Night was announced as joint winner with Lyn McConchie's  The Questing Road. I felt—and feel—tremendously honoured to receive such an accolade for Heir from readers of SFF, but also to share the podium with Lyn McConchie who has been pioneering New Zealand-based SFF in the international arena (almost?) as long as I have been reading it.

Of course, then I could relax—and fully enjoy the bottle of bubbly that Karen bought for our table—as the remaining awards were announced. Although I was back on tenterhooks again when the Best Artwork award came up, because The Wall of Night map from Heir, drawn by Peter Fitzpatrick, was a finalist. Although disappointed that the map did not win the award, I was still thrilled when the award went to Frank Victoria, the husband of my friend Mary Victoria, for the cover of Tymon's Flight, Mary's first novel in the Chronicles of the Tree series.

Other moments of tension—despite the insulating effect of those bubbles —came during the short story award, where my friends Ripley Patton and Lee Murray were both finalists, but the award went to Paul Haines for  High Tide at Hot Water Beach. My other major moment was announcing the award for "Best New Talent" where both contenders,  Mary Victoria and Karen Healey, are writers whose work I very much admire—and whom I like very much as well.  I was correspondingly glad that I only had to announce the result and not actually make it—and in the end the award went to Karen Healey, author of Guardian of the Dead.

So like all such ceremonies, there were both disappointments for friends and their work, as well as the joy of being able to congratulate others on their success. The latter included both Simon Litten, who won the award for "Services to Science Fiction, Fantasy and Horror", and Paul Tobin who received the award for "Best Production/Publication" as editor of the anthology White Cloud World.

The full list of professional awards given was as follows:

Best Novel:

The Heir of Night (Orbit) by Helen Lowe
The Questing Road (Tor) by Lyn McConchie

Best Novel: Young Adult:

Summer of Dreaming by Lyn McConchie

Best Novella/Novelette:

A Tale Of The Interferers – Hunger For Forbidden Flesh (Andromeda Spaceways Inflight magazie) by Paul Haines

Best Short Story:

High Tide At Hot Water Beach (A Foreign Country anthology) by Paul Haines

Best Collected Work:

A Foreign Country: New Zealand Speculative Fiction (Random Static) eds. Anna Caro & K Buchanan

Best Production/Publication:

White Clouds World Anthology, ed. Paul Tobin

For the full list of categories and finalists, both professional and fan, please see here.