Novel
Novella
Short Fiction
“Glass Bottle Dancer” by Celeste Rita Baker in Lightspeed Magazine, 4/20
Anthology
Collection
Artist
Rovina Cai
Special Award — Professional
C. C. Finlay for F&SF editing
Special Award — Non-Professional
Brian Attebery for Journal of the Fantastic in the Arts The World Fantasy Awards have been awarded since 1975; previous Novel award winners include Ursula K. LeGuin for The Other Wind (2002), Louise Erdrich for The Antelope Wife (1999), and G. Willow Wilson for Alif the Unseen (2013). While the awards are focused exclusively on works either written originally in, or translated into, English, winners are more international and diverse than one might assume. Nnedi Okorafor took the Novel award in 2011 for Who Fears Death, and Haruki Murakami in 2006 for Kafka on the Shore. The World Fantasy Convention also awarded Lifetime Achievement Awards to Howard Waldorp and Megan Lindholm. Book awards have been under similar scrutiny as film awards for their tendency to support white, cis-het male authors. In the case of the World Fantasy Awards, this seems to have been addressed earlier, and especially since 2020 the award winners across categories are an interesting cross-section of the fantasy publishing world. You can find a full list of winners here, and nominees here. Congratulations to all nominees and winners of the 2021 World Fantasy Awards.