1980's, Fantasy, Sci-Fi & Fantasy Award Winners, Science Fiction

The Most Award Winning Science Fiction & Fantasy Books Of 1987

“What are the most award-winning Science Fiction & Fantasy books of 1987?” We looked at all the large SFF book awards given, aggregating and ranking the books that appeared so we could answer that very question!

A note on our grading system: We give 5 points for every nomination a book received and an additional 5 points for each win. These values are purely arbitrary, easy to add up, numbers. For more info on our super scientific grading system visit our Info page. For a full list of the awards and award winners can be found below our rankings at the bottom of the page.

Before we take a look at the top Science Fiction & Fantasy Books of 1987, let’s set the scene for those awards by taking a look at what else was happening that year:

1987

The first “naked-eye” supernova since 1604. Aretha Franklin becomes 1st woman induced into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame. Iran-Contra affair comes to light publically. Margaret Thatcher led Conservative party re-elected in United Kingdom. Canada introduces one-dollar coin named Loonie. Tsunami hits the Gulf of Alaska. Mega Man Released in Japan. First non-Seattle Starbucks opens in Vancouver and Chicago. Deaths – Andy Warhol, James Tiptree Jr., Rita Hayworth, Fred Astaire, Lee Marvin, John Huston, Joseph Campbell, James Baldwin, etc. Popular Entertainment Released – Star Trek: The Next Generation, Full Metal Jacket, The Princess Bride, Married With Children, Full House, Predator, Spaceballs, Lethal Weapon, RoboCop, Wall Street, Adventures in Babysitting, Evil Dead II, Raising Arizona, 3 Men and a Baby, Good Morning Vietnam, etc. Non SFF Books – Beloved, Norwegian Wood, Hatchet, The Bonfire of the Vanities, etc.

And now, on to the list…

 



The Top Science Fiction & Fantasy Books Of 1987



49 .) Wrack & Roll by Bradley Denton

Wrack and Roll by Bradley Denton

AwardPoints
Locus New Novel5 ( Nomination )

Total

5

This book is set in an Alternate America. When President Franklin Roosevelt choked to death on a chicken bone in 1933, it signaled the start of a brave new world – a world in which America would ally with the USSR against the threat of the Anglo-Chinese Alliance – a world where the death on the Moon of rock superstar Bitch Alice sparked a Wracker explosion that would would obliterate America’s space programme and leave Straight and Wracker alike at the mercy of their enemies’ nuclear bomb-loaded station.

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48 .) The Pet by Charles L. Grant

The Pet by Charles L. Grant

AwardPoints
The World Fantasy Awards5 ( Nomination )

Total

5

“The village of Ashford, New Jersey, is about to discover terror. The Howler, a bloody killer who has already shredded six teens, is moving in.

Seventeen-year-old Don Boyd doesn’t need the grief. He’s already under siege — jock trouble, girl trouble, school trouble, family trouble.

The one frosty autumn night, Don is jumped by the Howler. Suddenly they’re surrounded by fog, green fire, the sound of iron striking iron . . .”

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47 .) Strangers by Dean Koontz

Strangers by Dean Koontz

AwardPoints
The World Fantasy Awards5 ( Nomination )

Total

5

Six strangers are unaccountably seized by nightmares, attacks of fear, and bouts of uncharacteristic behavior. The six begin to seek each other out as puzzling photographs and messages arrive, indicating that the cause may lie in a forgotten weekend stay at an isolated Nevada motel. Koontz has topped a fine roster of horror and suspense novels with an almost unbearably suspenseful page-turner. His ability to maintain the mystery through several plot twists is impressive, as is his array of believable and sympathetic characters. With its masterful blend of elements of espionage, terror, and even some science fiction, Strangers may be the suspense novel of the year.

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46 .) Free Live Free by Gene Wolfe

Free Live Free by Gene Wolfe

AwardPoints
Nebula5 ( Nomination )

Total

5

“””Free Live Free,”” said the newspaper ad, and the out-of-work detective Jim Stubb, the occultist Madame Serpentina, the salesman Ozzie Barnes, and the overweight prostitute Candy Garth are brought together to live for a time in Free’s old house, a house scheduled for demolition to make way for a highway.

Free drops mysterious hints of his exile from his homeland, and of the lost key to his return. And so when demolition occurs and Free disappears, the four make a pact to continue the search, which ultimately takes them far beyond their wildest dreams.”

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45 .) Eon by Greg Bear

Eon (The Way #1) by Greg Bear

AwardPoints
Arthur C. Clark Awards5 ( Nomination )

Total

5

“The 21st century was on the brink of nuclear confrontation when the 300 kilometer-long stone flashed out of nothingness and into Earth’s orbit. NASA, NATO, and the UN sent explorers to the asteroid’s surface…and discovered marvels and mysteries to drive researchers mad.

For the Stone was from space–but perhaps not our space; it came from the future-but perhaps not our future; and within the hollowed asteroid was Thistledown. The remains of a vanished civilization. A human-English, Russian, and Chinese-speaking-civilization. Seven vast chambers containing forests, lakes, rivers, hanging cities…

And museums describing the Death; the catastrophic war that was about to occur; the horror and the long winter that would follow. But while scientists and politicians bickered about how to use the information to stop the Death, the Stone yielded a secret that made even Earth’s survival pale into insignificance.”

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44 .) Heart of the Comet by Gregory Benford & David Brin

Heart of the Comet by David Brin

AwardPoints
Locus Awards Sci-Fi5 ( Nomination )

Total

5

Prescient and scientifically accurate, Heart of the Comet is known as one of the great “hard sf” novels of the 1980s. First published in 1986, it tells the story of an ambitious manned mission to visit Halley’s Comet and alter its orbit, to mine it for resources. But all too soon, native cells— that might once have brought life to Earth—begin colonizing the colonists. As factions battle over the comet’s future . . . and that of Earth . . . only love, courage and ingenuity can avert disaster, and possibly spark a new human destiny.

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43 .) The Fionavar Tapestry by Guy Gavriel Kay

The Fionavar Tapestry (The Fionavar Tapestry #1-3 omnibus) by Guy Gavriel Kay

AwardPoints
Mythopoeic Fantasy Award5 ( Nomination )

Total

5

“Five university students embark on a journey of self-discovery when they enter a realm of wizards and warriors, gods and mythical creatures–and good and evil…
It all began with a lecture that introduced five university students to a man who would change their lives, a wizard who would take them from Earth to the heart of the first of all worlds–Fionavar. And take them Loren Silvercloak did, for his need–the need of Fionavar and all the worlds–was great indeed.”

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42 .) Escape Plans by Gwyneth Jones

Escape Plans by Gwyneth Jones

AwardPoints
Arthur C. Clark Awards5 ( Nomination )

Total

5

To VENTUR the Subs were a nuisance. The underworld’s billions were fed and housed: under the stern but loving care of the great machine systems. True, they had to live in packed hives underground, to preserve the unique beauty of the only living world in the known universe. But their cultures were respected, their welfare was assured, and a minority even had meaningful work to do. There was no cause for complaint. Only the Subs, the “numbers” of the former Indian Sub-Continent, refused to be grateful and humble… ALIC was an innocent tourist, a retired games conceiver, drawn to the old home planet, and to the restive “Subcontinent” in the hopes of a little old-fashioned excitement. Then she met Millie, who invited her to play a game that would be like no other. And ALIC fell into the depths, into the churning, peopled void. Her whole existence became a frantic series of escape attempts; while around her a proud, ancient culture surged toward violent revolt against the all-powerful Space Habitats.

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41 .) Foundation and Earth by Isaac Asimov

Foundation and Earth (Foundation Universe) by Isaac Asimov

AwardPoints
Locus Awards Sci-Fi5 ( Nomination )

Total

5

The fifth novel in Asimov’s popular Foundation series opens with second thoughts. Councilman Golan Trevize is wondering if he was right to choose a collective mind as the best possible future for humanity over the anarchy of contentious individuals, nations and planets. To test his conclusion, he decides he must know the past and goes in search of legendary Earth, all references to which have been erased from galactic libraries. The societies encountered along the way become arguing points in a book-long colloquy about man’s fate, conducted by Trevize and traveling companion Bliss, who is part of the first world/mind, Gaia.

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40 .) Merlin’s Booke by Jane Yolen

Merlin's Booke by Jane Yolen

AwardPoints
Mythopoeic Fantasy Award5 ( Nomination )

Total

5

There is perhaps no more beloved and enduring myth in the Western canon than the story of King Arthur, his knights, Queen Guinevere, and of course, his mysterious tutor and magical advisor, Merlin. A sorcerer, sage, prophet, and teacher, Merlin’s mysterious life has inspired a vast array of classic works while giving rise to numerous conflicting legends. Here, award-winning author Jane Yolen, one of the most acclaimed fantasy writers of our time, retells Merlin’s tales as never before.

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39 .) Queen of the States by Josephine Saxton

Queen of the States by Josephine Saxton

AwardPoints
Arthur C. Clark Awards5 ( Nomination )

Total

5

This book is about Magdalen, a woman who is on her own planet, out to lunch and on her own trip. She moves through time and space, from a private mental hospital to an alien spaceship where she is interrogated about human behaviour and the function of sex. Is Magdalen mad, or have the aliens really landed? She weaves her way through the fantasies of those around her – husband Clive, psychiatrist Dr. Murgatroyd, lovers, friends and friends’ lovers – until, finally, she can reclaim her own existence.

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38 .) Dark Seeker by K. W. Jeter

Dark Seeker by K.W. Jeter

AwardPoints
Philip K. Dick5 ( Nomination )

Total

5

Caught up in the lethal madness of a Manson-like cult, Tyler has lost everything that once mattered to him. Out of prison, on a strict regimen of medications to keep the demons inside his head from returning, he knows he’s always one small step away from returning to that dark place and its horrors.

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37 .) The Memory of Whiteness by Kim Stanley Robinson

The Memory of Whiteness- A Scientific Romance by Kim Stanley Robinson

AwardPoints
Arthur C. Clark Awards5 ( Nomination )

Total

5

In 3229 A.D., human civilization is scattered among the planets, moons, and asteroids of the solar system. Billions of lives depend on the technology derived from the breakthroughs of the greatest physicist of the age, Arthur Holywelkin. But in the last years of his life, Holywelkin devoted himself to building a strange, beautiful, and complex musical instrument that he called The Orchestra.

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36 .) The Crystal Empire by L. Neil Smith

Crystal Empire by L. Neil Smith

AwardPoints
Prometheus5 ( Nomination )

Total

5

“Earth is ruled by three mighty empires: The Saracen-Jewish Empire led by the Caliph of Rome, the Mughal-Arab Empire, ferocious in its determination to destroy its neighbor, and the great Sino-Aztec’s Crystal Empire, led by a living God.

Little is known about the Crystal Empire, which spans most of western America. But it is the most powerful force surviving on Earth and its might is unchallenged.

One man, however, will change that. Sedrich Sedrichsohn, a legendary fallen fighter, has a chance at redemption and nothing will stand in his way to reclaim his life and his purpose, even if he must fight the Sun-God himself.”

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35 .) Black Genesis by L. Ron Hubbard

Black Genesis (Mission Earth #2) by L. Ron Hubbard

AwardPoints
Hugo5 ( Nomination )

Total

5

“Drugs. Sex. Murder. Taxes. Welcome to planet Earth.

They’re here. They’ve arrived. And they’re all eyes. The Voltarian scouting party—illegal aliens extraordinaire—on a top-secret expedition led by one Jettero Heller, Royal Officer of the Fleet.

His mission: rescue the planet from pollution—and make it safe for the upcoming invasion.”

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34 .) The Journal of Nicholas the American by Leigh Kennedy

The Journal Of Nicholas The American by Leigh Kennedy

AwardPoints
Nebula5 ( Nomination )

Total

5

“College student Nicholas Dal shares the family talent — he’s a tele-empath who experiences the emotions of others. And overpowering emotion can induce seizures. So Nicholas has lived alone and dull with vodka.

But there’s something about a woman in his history class that breaks through his isolation. She is passionate and fiery, yet she hides a sorrow only he can sense. And there is danger for him in their intimacy, for her mother, Susanne, is dying, and has need of Nicholas’s talent. Will he risk his love, his sanity, even his life to be with Susanne on her journey past the edge of existence?”

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33 .) The Cross-Time Engineer by Leo Frankowski

The Cross-Time Engineer (Conrad Stargard #1) by Leo Frankowski

AwardPoints
Locus New Novel5 ( Nomination )

Total

5

“One moment Conrad Schwartz was a hungover hiker in the mountains of modern Poland, the next he was running for his life from an angry Teutonic Knight.

At first Conrad just thought he’d stumbled across a mad hermit. But several days of ever stranger events convinced him that he had somehow been stranded in 1231 A.D.”

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32 .) Shards of Honor by Lois McMaster Bujold

Shards of Honour (Vorkosigan Saga (Publication) #1) by Lois McMaster Bujold

AwardPoints
Locus New Novel5 ( Nomination )

Total

5

When Cordelia Naismith and her survey crew are attacked by a renegade group from Barrayar, she is taken prisoner by Aral Vorkosigan, commander of the Barrayan ship that has been taken over by an ambitious and ruthless crew member. Aral and Cordelia survive countless mishaps while their mutual admiration and even stronger feelings emerge.

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31 .) Green Eyes by Lucius Shepard

Green Eyes by Lucius Shepard

AwardPoints
Arthur C. Clark Awards5 ( Nomination )

Total

5

A carnival worker dead of alcohol poisoning, Donnell Harrison has been reborn with new memories and a profound literary talent. To reconnect him to the world and make him pliant, the reanimation team employs Jocundra Verret, a therapist who has gained the trust of numerous subjects, but when Donnell finds his latent power to control energy, Jocundra shares his doubts about the scientists’ goals. Together they flee on a quest to discover Donnell’s true origins and potential, and ultimately to confront evil at the heart of a fabulous bayou dynasty, where Donnell must restore order among strange and brutal alternate worlds.

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30 .) Life During Wartime by Lucius Shepard

Life During Wartime by Lucius Shepard

AwardPoints
Philip K. Dick5 ( Nomination )

Total

5

David Mingolla soon learns that escape from the rotten jungles of Guatemala is impossible – he is once more a pawn of secret, ruthless forces lusting for world domination. They try to dominate David by ordering him to kill the woman he loves.

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29 .) The Tricksters by Margaret Mahy

The Tricksters by Margaret Mahy

AwardPoints
The World Fantasy Awards5 ( Nomination )

Total

5

Reality and the supernatural intertwine in this exciting and chilling novel from an award-winning author; As the Hamiltons gather at their holiday beach house, Carnival’s Hide, for their Christmas celebrations, the warm, chaotic familty atomosphere is chilled by the unexpected arrival of three sinister brothers. Who are they? Where are they from? Only 17-year-old Harry, the middle daughter, is close to seeing the truth. Are these brothers her own invention, or are they truly descendants of Teddy Carnival who drowned there many years earlier? As the brothers gradually reveal their purpose, long-hidden family secrets are also unfurled. No one emerges unscarhed.

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28 .) Circuit Breaker by Melinda M. Snodgrass

Circuit Breaker (Circuit #2) by Melinda M. Snodgrass

AwardPoints
Prometheus5 ( Nomination )

Total

5

Judge Cabot Huntington becomes caught in the middle of a conflict between ruthless, corrupt industrial powers on Earth and a group of proud, determined colonists over newly discovered diamond mines on Mars.

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27 .) Memories by Mike McQuay

MEMORIES by Mike McQuay

AwardPoints
Philip K. Dick5 ( Nomination )

Total

5

Memories is a sweeping, multi-layered odyssey filled with stunning imagery, breathtaking intensity and high drama.

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26 .) Mindplayers by Pat Cadigan

Mindplayers by Pat Cadigan

AwardPoints
Philip K. Dick5 ( Nomination )

Total

5

Mindplayers are tomorrow’s psychoanalysts, linked directly to their patients using sophisticated machinery attached to the optic nerve. In one-to-one Mindplay contact, you can be inside someone else’s head, wandering the landscapes of their consciousness. Allie is a sensation-seeking young woman, obtaining illicit thrills from her shady friend Jerry Wirerammer. But Allie goes badly astray when Jerry supplies her with a “madcap” – a device that lets you temporarily and harmlessly experience psychosis. There’s something wrong with Jerry’s madcap, and the psychosis doesn’t go away when it’s disconnected. Allie ends up undergoing treatment at a “dry-cleaner”, and she is faced with a stark choice – jail, for her illegal use of the madcap; or training to become a Mindplayer herself.

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25 .) Twisting the Rope by R. A. MacAvoy

Twisting the Rope (Black Dragon #2) by R.A. MacAvoy

AwardPoints
Locus Awards Fantasy5 ( Nomination )

Total

5

R.A. MacAvoy is a truly gifted author who has no need to rely on the conventions of the science fictioni genre in order to hold the reader’s attention. Her highly original debut novel, Tea With the Black Dragon, combined elements of mystery and fantasy along with a fascination with computer technology, and was highly praised by critics, while her Lens of the World trilogy appeared on many “best of the year” lists in the national news media. In this sequel to Tea With the Black Dragon, Mayland Long is once again thrust into a maelstrom of mysterious happenings. The peaceful relationship he has established with Martha Macnamara is being threatened. A wild psychic force is loose in the world, while Martha’s granddaughter has been kidnapped and one of her Celtic musician friends has been found dead, hangingby a rope of twisted grass. Now the Black Dragon must use his wits to hunt for the killer…even if it brings him to a horrifying realization.

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24 .) Becoming Alien by Rebecca Ore

Becoming Alien (Saga of Tom Red-Clay #1) by Rebecca Ore

AwardPoints
Philip K. Dick5 ( Nomination )

Total

5

16-year old boy finds an alien crash-landed on a farm and ends up being recruited to join the Federation of Sapients – and adventuring out among the stars.

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23 .) Dover Beach by Richard Bowker

Dover Beach (The Last P.I. #1) by Richard Bowker

AwardPoints
Philip K. Dick5 ( Nomination )

Total

5

“In an America broken by a “”limited”” nuclear war, no one has use for would-be private eye Wally Sands. No one except for Dr. Charles Winfield, an eccentric scientist who believes he was cloned from a prominent biochemist as part of a top-secret project undertaken before the war.

Sands sets out to find Winfield’s mysterious progenitor, but finds himself on the trail of a killer instead.

Now, in far-away, fabled England, Sands must uncover the facts about the case that has brought him to his promised land, and at the same time confront the unsettling truth about his world, his life, and his loyalties.”

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22 .) A Hidden Place by Robert Charles Wilson

A Hidden Place by Robert Charles Wilson

AwardPoints
Locus New Novel5 ( Nomination )

Total

5

In the hard years of the Depression, young Travis lives with his uncle and aunt. Upstairs lives the mysterious Anna. Anna says she’s going to be “changing,” and she needs Travis’s help…for purposes she won’t explain.

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21 .) Blood of Amber by Roger Zelazny

Blood of Amber (The Chronicles of Amber #7) by Roger Zelazny

AwardPoints
Locus Awards Fantasy5 ( Nomination )

Total

5

Pursued by a fiendish enemy, Merle must battle through an intricate web of vengeance and murder that threatens more than the San Francisco Bay area. For Merle Corey of California is also Merlin, son of Corwin, vanished Prince of Amber; and the forces, seeking to destroy the royal house, have unleashed sorceries that can strike anywhere, especially at the very heart of Amber.

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20 .) Stars in My Pocket Like Grains of Sand by Samuel R. Delany

Stars in My Pocket Like Grains of Sand by Samuel R. Delany

AwardPoints
Arthur C. Clark Awards5 ( Nomination )

Total

5

The novel’s topic is information itself: What are the repercussions, once it has been made public, that two individuals have been found to be each other’s perfect erotic object out to “point nine-nine-nine and several nines percent more”? What will it do to the individuals involved, to the city they inhabit, to their geosector, to their entire world society, especially when one is an illiterate worker, the sole survivor of a world destroyed by “cultural fugue,” and the other is—you!

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19 .) Tales from the Flat Earth by Tanith Lee

Delirium's Mistress (Tales from the Flat Earth #4) by Tanith Lee

AwardPoints
Mythopoeic Fantasy Award5 ( Nomination )

Total

5

Delirium’s Mistress. Azhriaz, Daughter of Night, was the child of Night’s Master, and he had hidden her where none could find her None, that is, but his enemy Chuz, who spirited Azhriaz away to the world above.

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18 .) Talking Man by Terry Bisson

Talking Man by Terry Bisson

AwardPoints
The World Fantasy Awards5 ( Nomination )

Total

5

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17 .) Godbody by Theodore Sturgeon

Godbody by Theodore Sturgeon

AwardPoints
Locus Awards Fantasy5 ( Nomination )

Total

5

Everything changes when Godbody comes to town. He appears out of nowhere, enigmatic and breathtaking, to touch the lives of a chosen few. To them he offers a vision of what life could be—spreading his message of love, generosity, sensuosness, and freedom—and before long he has erased their sadness and opened their hearts. Still, there are those in town who, corrupt and powerful, are threatened by what Godbody brings, and for this reason he must pay the ultimate price. But before his preordained end, Godbody will accomplish something truly miraculous.

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16 .) The Ragged Astronauts by Bob Shaw

The Ragged Astronauts (Land and Overland Series #1) by Bob Shaw

AwardPoints
Hugo5 ( Nomination )
Arthur C. Clark Awards5 ( Nomination )

Total

10

Land and Overland – twin worlds a few thousand miles apart. On Land, humanity faces a threat to its very survival – an airborne species, the ptertha, has declared war on humankind, and is actively hunting for victims. The only hope lies in migration. Through space to Overland. By balloon. The Ragged Astronauts – first volume in an epic adventure filled with memorable characters, intense action, engaging notions, exotic locales.

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15 .) The Hercules Text by Jack McDevitt

The Hercules Text by Jack McDevitt

AwardPoints
Locus New Novel10 ( Win )

Total

10

“From a remote corner of the galaxy a message is being sent. The continuous beats of a pulsar have become odd, irregular…artificial. It can only be a code.

Frantically, a research team struggles to decipher the alien communication. And what the scientists discover is destined to shake the foundations of empires around this world—from Wall Street to the Vatican…”

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14 .) This is the Way the World Ends by James K. Morrow

This Is the Way the World Ends by James K. Morrow

AwardPoints
Nebula5 ( Nomination )
John W. Campbell Memorial Award for Best Science Fiction Novel5 ( Nomination )

Total

10

The Gulliver’s Travels of the nuclear age, the Alice in Wonderland of the arms race, this mordantly funny and visionary tale of the apocalypse was a Nebula finalist. The trouble starts when George Paxton ingenuously signs an admission of complicity in starting World War III.

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13 .) Elleander Morning by Jerry Yulsman,

Elleander Morning by Jerry Yulsman

AwardPoints
Kurd-Labwitz-Preis Foreign Book10 ( Win )

Total

10

“A dying woman, given a second chance to relive her life, travels back in time. Her goal: the execution of an obscure Viennese artist named Adolf Hitler. Two generations later, the assassin’s granddaughter is mystified to discover a book relating the history of World War II ― the chronicle of a conflict that never took place.
Elleander Morning spans eight decades of the twentieth century, tracing two different timelines from two very different worlds and raising thought-provoking questions along the way. Part detective story, part thriller, and part romance, this alternative history won the 1986 Ditmar Award for best international fiction and the 1987 Kurd-Laßwitz-Preis. This edition features a new Introduction by Gavriel Rosenfeld, an expert on Nazi Germany and the Holocaust.”

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12 .) Gráinne by Keith Roberts

Gráinne by Keith Roberts

AwardPoints
BSFA10 ( Win )

Total

10

Meet Gráinne: blue-stocking seductress, darling of the media, painfully human yet mysterious as her great namesake, the proud girl-goddess who plunged all Ireland into war and shadow…

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11 .) Strange Toys by Patricia Geary

Strange Toys by Patricia Geary

AwardPoints
Philip K. Dick10 ( Win )

Total

10

Strange Toys is a stunningly original and penetrating novel blending the real and unreal, the fantastic and the mundane, in a story of love, power, and the occult that carries one young woman on a difficult and dangerous journey. Pet is her name. At nine, she is struggling to protect her family from the horrors predicted in her strange older sister’s book of secrets horrors that indeed come true. At sixteen, Pet is hunting down her older sister to wreak vengeance or something else. At thirty, Pet attains strength and power enough to protect her from the present but not from her sister’s raging past. With humor, insight, compassion, and unrelenting suspense, Patricia Geary’s Strange Toys takes the reader on parallel tours into the world of the supernatural and into the life of a young woman struggling to make peace with the known and unknown.

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10 .) Perfume by Patrick Süskind

Perfume- The Story of a Murderer by Patrick Süskind

AwardPoints
The World Fantasy Awards10 ( Win )

Total

10

In the slums of eighteenth-century France, the infant Jean-Baptiste Grenouille is born with one sublime gift—an absolute sense of smell. As a boy, he lives to decipher the odors of Paris, and apprentices himself to a prominent perfumer who teaches him the ancient art of mixing precious oils and herbs. But Grenouille’s genius is such that he is not satisfied to stop there, and he becomes obsessed with capturing the smells of objects such as brass doorknobs and fresh-cut wood. Then one day he catches a hint of a scent that will drive him on an ever-more-terrifying quest to create the “ultimate perfume”—the scent of a beautiful young virgin. Told with dazzling narrative brilliance, Perfume is a hauntingly powerful tale of murder and sensual depravity.

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9 .) The Folk of the Air by Peter Beagle

The Folk of the Air by Peter S. Beagle

AwardPoints
Mythopoeic Fantasy Award10 ( Win )

Total

10

While attending the revels of the League for Archaic Pleasurs, a group dedicated to the pleasures of the medieval period, Joe Farrell comes face-to-face with Nicholas Bonner, a spirit from the past and an ancient evil.

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8 .) It by Stephen King

It by Stephen King

AwardPoints
Locus Awards Fantasy5 ( Nomination )
The World Fantasy Awards5 ( Nomination )

Total

10

They were seven teenagers when they first stumbled upon the horror. Now they are grown-up men and women who have gone out into the big world to gain success and happiness. But the promise they made twenty-eight years ago calls them reunite in the same place where, as teenagers, they battled an evil creature that preyed on the city’s children. Now, children are being murdered again and their repressed memories of that terrifying summer return as they prepare to once again battle the monster lurking in Derry’s sewers.

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7 .) Neuromancer by William Gibson

AwardPoints
Japan Seiun Translated10 ( Win )

Total

10

Case had been the sharpest data-thief in the business, until vengeful former employees crippled his nervous system. But now a new and very mysterious employer recruits him for a last-chance run. The target: an unthinkably powerful artificial intelligence orbiting Earth in service of the sinister Tessier-Ashpool business clan. With a dead man riding shotgun and Molly, mirror-eyed street-samurai, to watch his back, Case embarks on an adventure that ups the ante on an entire genre of fiction.

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6 .) Soldier of the Mist by Gene Wolfe

Soldier Of The Mist (Latro #1) by Gene Wolfe

AwardPoints
Locus Awards Fantasy10 ( Win )
The World Fantasy Awards5 ( Nomination )

Total

15

The first volume of Gene Wolfe’s powerful story of Latro, a Roman mercenary who received a head injury that deprived him of his short-term memory. In return it gave him the ability to converse with supernatural creatures, gods and goddesses who invisibly inhabit the ancient landscape.

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5 .) A Door into Ocean by Joan Slonczewski

A Door Into Ocean (Elysium Cycle) by Joan Slonczewski

AwardPoints
Prometheus5 ( Nomination )
John W. Campbell Memorial Award for Best Science Fiction Novel10 ( Win )

Total

15

A Door into Ocean is the novel upon which the author’s reputation as an important SF writer principally rests. A ground-breaking work both of feminist SF and of world-building hard SF, it concerns the Sharers of Shora, a nation of women on a distant moon in the far future who are pacifists, highly advanced in biological sciences, and who reproduce by parthenogenesis–there are no males–and tells of the conflicts that erupt when a neighboring civilization decides to develop their ocean world, and send in an army.

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4 .) Marooned in Realtime by Vernor Vinge

Marooned in Realtime (Across Realtime #2) by Vernor Vinge

AwardPoints
Hugo5 ( Nomination )
Prometheus10 ( Win )

Total

15

In this taut thriller, a Hugo finalist for Best Novel, nobody knows why there are only three hundred humans left alive on the Earth fifty million years from now. Opinion is fiercely divided on whether to settle in and plant the seed of mankind anew, or to continue using high-energy stasis fields, or “bobbles,” in venturing into the future. When somebody is murdered, it’s obvious someone has a secret he or she is willing to kill to preserve.The murder intensifies the rift between the two factions, threatening the survival of the human race. It’s up to 21st century detective Wil Brierson, the only cop left in the world, to find the culprit, a diabolical fiend whose lust for power could cause the utter extinction of man.

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3 .) Count Zero by William Gibson

Count Zero (Sprawl #2) by William Gibson

AwardPoints
Nebula5 ( Nomination )
Hugo5 ( Nomination )
Locus Awards Sci-Fi5 ( Nomination )
SF Chronicle Award5 ( Nomination )

Total

20

Turner, corporate mercenary, wakes in a reconstructed body, a beautiful woman by his side. Then Hosaka Corporation reactivates him for a mission more dangerous than the one he’s recovering from: Maas-Neotek’s chief of R&D is defecting. Turner is the one assigned to get him out intact, along with the biochip he’s perfected. But this proves to be of supreme interest to certain other parties–some of whom aren’t remotely human.

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2 .) The Handmaid’s Tale by Margaret Atwood

The Handmaid's Tale by Margaret Atwood

AwardPoints
Nebula5 ( Nomination )
Locus Awards Sci-Fi5 ( Nomination )
Prometheus5 ( Nomination )
Arthur C. Clark Awards10 ( Win )
SF Chronicle Award5 ( Nomination )

Total

30

“Offred is a Handmaid in the Republic of Gilead. She may leave the home of the Commander and his wife once a day to walk to food markets whose signs are now pictures instead of words because women are no longer allowed to read. She must lie on her back once a month and pray that the Commander makes her pregnant, because in an age of declining births, Offred and the other Handmaids are only valued if their ovaries are viable.

Offred can remember the days before, when she lived and made love with her husband Luke; when she played with and protected her daughter; when she had a job, money of her own, and access to knowledge. But all of that is gone now….”

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1 .) Speaker for the Dead by Orson Scott Card

Speaker for the Dead (The Ender Quintet #2) by Orson Scott Card

AwardPoints
Locus Awards Sci-Fi10 ( Win )
John W. Campbell Memorial Award for Best Science Fiction Novel5 ( Nomination )
Nebula10 ( Win )
Hugo10 ( Win )
SF Chronicle Award10 ( Win )

Total

45

“In the aftermath of his terrible war, Ender Wiggin disappeared, and a powerful voice arose: The Speaker for the Dead, who told the true story of the Bugger War.

Now, long years later, a second alien race has been discovered, but again the aliens’ ways are strange and frightening…again, humans die. And it is only the Speaker for the Dead, who is also Ender Wiggin the Xenocide, who has the courage to confront the mystery…and the truth.”

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The 1987 Award Nominations & Winners

(Winners Highlighted)


 

Nebula Award – Best Novel

BookAuthor
Speaker for the Dead Orson Scott Card
Count Zero William Gibson
Free Live Free Gene Wolfe
The Handmaid’s Tale Margaret Atwood
The Journal of Nicholas the American Leigh Kennedy
This is the Way the World Ends James K. Morrow

 

Hugo Award – Best Novel

BookAuthor
Speaker for the Dead Orson Scott Card
The Ragged Astronauts Bob Shaw
Count Zero William Gibson
Marooned in Realtime Vernor Vinge
Black Genesis L. Ron Hubbard

 

Arthur C. Clark Award– Best Novel First Published In United Kingdom in Previous Year

BookAuthor
The Handmaid’s Tale Margaret Atwood
The Ragged Astronauts Bob Shaw
Eon Greg Bear
Stars in My Pocket Like Grains of Sand Samuel R. Delany
Escape Plans Gwyneth Jones
The Memory of Whiteness Kim Stanley Robinson
Queen of the States Josephine Saxton
Green Eyes Lucius Shepard

 

Locus Award – Best Science Fiction Novel

BookAuthor
Speaker for the Dead Orson Scott Card
Heart of the Comet Gregory Benford & David Brin
Count Zero William Gibson
The Handmaid’s Tale Margaret Atwood
Foundation and Earth Isaac Asimov

 

Locus Award – Best Fantasy Novel

BookAuthor
Soldier of the Mist Gene Wolfe
Blood of Amber Roger Zelazny
It Stephen King
Godbody Theodore Sturgeon
Twisting the Rope R. A. MacAvoy

 

Locus Award – Best First Novel

BookAuthor
The Hercules Text Jack McDevitt
Shards of Honor Lois McMaster Bujold
A Hidden Place Robert Charles Wilson
Wrack & Roll Bradley Denton
The Cross-Time Engineer Leo Frankowski

 

BSFA (British Science Fiction Association) – Best Novel

BookAuthor
Gráinne Keith Roberts

 

Philip K. Dick Award

BookAuthor
Strange Toys Patricia Geary
Memories Mike McQuay
Dover Beach Richard Bowker
Mindplayers Pat Cadigan
Dark Seeker K. W. Jeter
Becoming Alien Rebecca Ore
Life During Wartime Lucius Shepard

 

The World Fantasy Award – Best Novel

BookAuthor
Perfume Patrick Süskind
It Stephen King
The Pet Charles L. Grant
Soldier of the Mist Gene Wolfe
Strangers Dean Koontz
Talking Man Terry Bisson
The Tricksters Margaret Mahy

 

Prometheus Award – Best Novel

BookAuthor
Marooned in Realtime Vernor Vinge
Snodgrass Circuit Melinda M. Snodgrass
The Crystal Empire L. Neil Smith
A Door into Ocean Joan Slonczewski
The Handmaid’s Tale Margaret Atwood

 

Kurd-Lobwitz-Preis (German) – Foreign Fiction

BookAuthor
Elleander Morning Jerry Yulsman,

 

Seiun (Japanese) Award – Best Translated Novel

BookAuthor
Neuromancer William Gibson

 

John W. Campbell Memorial Award – Best Science Fiction Novel

BookAuthor
A Door into Ocean Joan Slonczewski
This Is the Way the World Ends James K. Morrow
Speaker for the Dead Orson Scott Card

 

Mythopoeic Fantasy Award – Adult Literature

BookAuthor
The Folk of the Air Peter Beagle
The Fionavar Tapestry Guy Gavriel Kay
Tales from the Flat Earth Tanith Lee
Merlin’s Booke Jane Yolen

 

SF Chronicle Award – Best Novel

BookAuthor
Speaker for the Dead Orson Scott Card
Count Zero William Gibson
The Handmaid’s Tale Margaret Atwood