AHWA NEWS DIGEST [16.05.09-01.06.09]

The following digest of recent horror news is compiled from pieces published to HorrorScope and the Australian Horror Writers' Association website.

Australian Shadows Award expands
Australia's top honour for horror fiction, the Australian Horror Writers Association's Australian Shadows Award, is now open for 2009 but with a major difference — this year, the Award has expanded from one to three categories; awards will be issued for the best works in Short Fiction (short stories), Long Fiction (novellas, novels, and single-author collections), and Edited Publication (for editors of anthologies and horror fiction magazines).

The Australian Shadows Award reading period is open from now until December 31. Works of horror and dark fantasy written or edited by Australians (or New Zealanders) and first published in the 2009 calendar year are eligible. Authors, editors, or publishers seeking to enter eligible work must contact Award Director Shane Jiraiya Cummings to arrange for the material to be submitted to the judges (no entry fee required). Click through for more details, including competition judges.

'Nameless' Competition open
Read the story (accessed through the AHWA site), get to know the story elements, the characters, their journey and their motivations. Then, write a fitting ending for ‘The Nameless’ and give the tale a title while you’re at it. The competition will run for one month - submissions close June 30. The six best endings will be featured on the HorrorScope site. A special guest judge will decide the winner. Click through for guidelines.

Dymocks Southland Bestselling Horror Titles for May ‘09
Dymocks Southland is a general bookshop in Cheltenham, Victoria, boasting an extensive range of genre stock. Dymocks Southland publishes Dymensions, a monthly SF, fantasy and horror newsletter. Click here to subscribe. Click through for the Top 10 Bestselling Horror titles for May 2009.

Victorian SF Chronos Awards opens
The Continuum Foundation has opened nominations for the inaugural Chronos Awards for excellence in SF, fantasy, and horror in the state of Victoria in 2008. Nominations from "natural persons active in fandom" or from full or supporting members of the Continuum 5 SF convention are open from now until June 28. The Chronos Awards will be presented at Continuum 5 in August. Nomination details available at HorrorScope.

Alan Baxter's RealmShift competition
Australian author and AHWA member Alan Baxter is offering a signed copy of his novel RealmShift to one lucky reader. Competition details are here. Competition ends June 9.

Midnight Echo #2 - Coming in June
This month watch out for Midnight Echo #2, edited by Angela Challis & Shane Jiraiya Cummings, and featuring creepy stories by Kurt Newton, Bob Franklin, David Conyers, Andrew J. McKiernan, Joanne Anderton, Shaun Jeffrey, Felicity Dowker, and many more... plus artwork from David Schembri and many talented dark fantasy artists.

BlackOnline Twitter
Black Magazine staff writer Gary Kemble has set up the Black Online Twitter site. For Twitter users, this is the ideal place to get all the latest dark fiction news in bite-sized pieces (including articles syndicated from HorrorScope and Robert Hood's Undead Backbrain). The BlackOnline Twitter site is here and the RSS feed is here.

Submitting News

If you have news about Australian and New Zealand Horror publishing and film, or news of professional development opportunities in the field, feel free to submit news to Talie Helene, AHWA News Editor. Just visit HorrorScope, and click on the convenient email link. (International news is not unwelcome, although relevance to Antipodean literary arts practitioners is strongly preferred.)

For information on the Australian Horror Writers' Association, visit australianhorror.com.

This AHWA NEWS DIGEST has been compiled, written, and republished in select Australian horror haunts by Talie Helene. Currently archived at the AHWA MySpace page, Southern Horror, and Darklands, and hosted by AHWA members Felicity Dowker, Brenton Tomlinson, Scott Wilson, and Jeff Ritchie (Scary Minds).

If you would like to support the AHWA News effort by hosting a copy of the AHWA News Digest on your blog or website, contact Talie to receive a fully formatted HTML edition of the digest by email.