It’s that time of year again where the Australian Ditmar Awards (our very own mini-Hugos) are open for nominations. These are the fan-voted awards where anyone active in fandom can nominate work they think is worthy. What the hell does “active in fandom” mean? Well, this is something that comes up all the time. If you’ve ever been to a con, or engaged online with readers and writers more than casually, if you review, anything like that, you probably qualify. Basically, if you pay attention in any way to the Australian SFFH scene, even just as a reader, you’re probably eligible to nominate. As the rules state: “Where a nominator may not be known to the Ditmar subcommittee, the nominator should provide the name of someone known to the subcommittee who can vouch for the nominator’s eligibility. Convention attendance or membership of an SF club are among the criteria which qualify a person as ‘active in fandom’, but are not the only qualifying criteria. If in doubt, nominate and mention your qualifying criteria.”
These awards are always under-represented and awards operate best when more people get involved, so if you’re keen to nominate, give it a go. If we’ve ever interacted, feel free to mention me with your nomination.
The current rules, including Award categories, can be found here: https://wiki.sf.org.au/Ditmar_
A partial and unofficial eligibility list, to which everyone is encouraged to add, can be found here: https://wiki.sf.org.au/2022_Ditmar_eligibility_list
And you can do it all online, via this form: https://ditmars.sf.org.au/2022/nominations.html
Am I eligible for any awards? Why, yes, I am, thanks for asking! Here’s what of mine is eligible this time:
THE GULP (13th Dragon Books, self-published, January 2021) is eligible in the Best Collected Work category (I’d love a Ditmar to go along with my Aurealis Award for this book!)
All 5 stories in The Gulp are eligible in Best Novella or Novelette:
“Out on a Rim”, Alan Baxter, in The Gulp, 13th Dragon Books, self-published.
“Mother In Bloom”, Alan Baxter, in The Gulp, 13th Dragon Books, self-published.
“48 To Go”, Alan Baxter, in The Gulp, 13th Dragon Books, self-published.
“The Band Plays On”, Alan Baxter, in The Gulp, 13th Dragon Books, self-published.
“Rock Fisher”, Alan Baxter, in The Gulp, 13th Dragon Books, self-published.
Also eligible in Best Novella or Novelette:
“Ghost Recall”, Alan Baxter, in Ghost Recall (Eli Carver 3), Grey Matter Press.
And I only had a couple of short stories published last year, but these are eligible in Best Short Story:
“Come His Children”, Alan Baxter, in Cthulhu Deep Down Under 3, IFWG Publishing International.
“Nurturing His Nature”, Alan Baxter, in The Bad Book, Bleeding Edge Books.
So if you feel like voting for anything of mine, THANK YOU! And please do vote for anything and everything from 2021 that you think is worthy. As I said at the start, the more people involved, the better the awards reflect the will of the fans. Now I’m off to make my nominations.